Bio 302 Lecture 14 History of Eugenics

Fitter Families for Future Firesides

- Competitors submit an "Abridged Record of Family Traits" - Doctors examine and grade each family member - Grades averaged across the family - 'B+' gets an award - Medals inscribed "Yea, I have a goodly heritage."

Harry Laughlin

- Director of Eugenics Record Office - Wrote model sterilization law

Negative Eugenics: Laws Against Race Mixing

- Eugenicists support anti-miscegenation laws - Efforts focus on legal definitions of who could qualify for a marriage license as a "white person." - Provide a 'scientific' basis for race assessment.

Immigration Restriction Act 1924

- Halt immigration of "dysgenic" Italians and Eastern European Jews. - Quota for these groups reduced from 45% to 15% - Limited immigration from Eastern Europe - Genetically "inferior" - "Pollute" American genes

Buck vs Bell Truth

- Vivian was a product of rape, not promiscuity - Did well in school - Died later due to illness

Rates of immigration into the United States

1870: 150,000/year 1900: 800,000/year 1907: 1,250,000/year

Degeneracy Theory

A theory that was based on the premise that certain (lower) social classes and races were predisposed to various neurological and mental illnesses due to bad heredity, resulting in social degradation. - This theory can be distinguished from Natural Selection, in that it attributed general conditions such as mental instability and poor health to certain types of behaviors, such as having an "immoral lifestyle."

Buck vs. Bell

Challenges Virginia's Sterilization Law

Abraham (2012) Unnatural selection: Is evolving reproductive technology ushering in a new age of eugenics?

Critics ranging from religious conservatives to advocates for the disabled worry that a new age of eugenics is rising, propelled not by racists, despots or elitists but by parental aspiration.

First U.S. Sterilization Law passed in:

Indiana (1907)

How many Americans Underwent Involuntary Sterilization?

Over the years, more than 60,000 Americans

1917 - Congress expands definition of those "likely to become a public charge."

"All idiots, imbeciles, feebleminded persons, epileptics, insane persons," and "mentally or physically defective."

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841-1935)

"It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind ... - "Three generations of imbeciles are enough." - Supreme Court Opinion 1927

Viginia Racial Integrity Act - 1924

- "It shall hereafter be unlawful for any white person in this State to marry any save a white person" - "The term 'white person' shall apply only to such person as has no trace whatsoever of any blood other than Caucasian." - May include ≤ 1/16 American Indian

F. Galton Coins Phrase "Nature vs. Nurture"

- "Nature is all that a man brings with him into the world" - "Nurture is every influence from without that affects him after birth."

Charles Darwin (1809-1882)

- "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life" (1859) - Develops the theory of Evolution

Sterilization in the United States

- 12 States enact Sterilization Laws by 1914 - At one time or another 33 States had statutes for sterilization

Herbert Spencer (1820-1903)

- A Sociologist who applied evolutionary theory to philosophy and the study of society - 'Social Darwinism' - writes the phrase "survival of the fittest"

Challenging Laws Against Race Mixing: Loving vs. Commonwealth of Virginia

- A grand jury issued an indictment charging the Lovings with violating Virginia's ban on interracial marriages. - The Lovings pleaded guilty to the charge and were sentenced to one year in jail - 1967 - US Supreme Court unanimously overturns the ruling.

Laughlin's Model Sterilization Law

- Authorized sterilization of the "socially inadequate" - People supported in institutions - Maintained wholly or in part by public expense - Encompasses the "feebleminded, insane, criminalistic, epileptic, inebriate, diseased, blind, deaf, deformed and dependent - including orphans, ne'er do wells, tramps, the homeless and paupers."

Buck vs. Bell Case:

- Carrie and Emma Buck shared the hereditary traits of "feeblemindedness" and promiscuity. - Therefore, Carrie Buck a "probable potential parent of socially inadequate offspring."

Eugenics in the 21st Century

- DNA recognized as the molecular basis for genetics since the mid-20th century - The human genome is mapped by the end of the 20th century - Burgeoning amounts of information link molecular patterns to disease and health - Efforts underway to investigate the interactions of multiple genes in the expression of complex traits

Eugenics Research: Flaws in Methodology

- Difficulty in defining traits - Tendency to treat complex traits as if they stemmed from a single cause - Discounted social and environmental influences on behavior - Poor survey and statistical methods

Charles Davenport

- Director of research station at Cold Spring Harbor - Interested in Quantification of Genetics

Francis Galton (1822-1911)

- In 1883 coins the word 'Eugenics' from the Greek for good ('eu') and born ('genics'). - Defined as "the science of improvement of the human race germ plasm through better breeding." - Charles Darwin's cousin

Designer Babies and the New Eugenics?

- Perfect 46 chromosome set in the near future? - Documents the rise and fall of genome-matching sevice

Negative Eugenics

- Prevention of breeding and reproduction for 'undesirable' characteristics: - Prevention of inter-racial marriage - Sterilization - Restriction of "undesirable" citizens (Immigration Restriction)

How did the U.S. try to "improve" the population?

- Sterilization Laws - Immigration Restriction - Prohibition Against Racial Inter-marriage

Economic, social, and political context of eugenics:

- The rapid growth of American industry - Increased mechanization of agriculture - Major migration away from farms - Cities expanded faster than adequate housing - Wholesale exploitation of labor - Huge influx of immigrants from Europe

Negative Eugenics: Immigration Restriction

1882 - Act to Regulate Immigration prohibits entry to "any person unable to take care of himself or herself without becoming a public charge."

2006 - 2010 Sterilization Event in U.S.

At least 148 women received tubal ligations in violation of prison rules during those five years

Eugenics in U.S.

Early to mid-1900s: US attempted to improve the population by preventing the introduction of "less desirable" traits.

Positive Eugenics

Encourage breeding and selection for favorable characteristics (e.g., animal husbandry) - Filter families contests (1926-27)

Gregor Mendel (1822-1884)

Experiments in Plant Hybridization (1865)

Eugenics

The attempt to improve the human species by selective breeding

Has Genetics Affected Social Policy and Law?

The misuse of genetics has affected social policy

How long was Sterilization practiced in the United States?

Through the 1970s

Why did the U.S. decide to stop trying to "improve" the population?

Used by Nazis in Germany to promote mass killings of individuals believed to be genetically inferior and ultimately genocide