Buck v. Bell: Inside the SCOTUS case that led to forced sterilization of 70,000 & inspired the Nazis

by ADAM COHEN

PHOTO/Duck Duck Go

As President Obama nominates centrist Judge Merrick Garland to replace late Justice Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court, we take a look at what’s been described as one of the worst Supreme Court rulings in history. In the 1927 case Buck v. Bell, the court upheld a statute that enabled the state of Virginia to sterilize so-called mental defectives or imbeciles. The person in question was Carrie Buck, a poor, young woman then confined in the Virginia State Colony for Epileptics and the Feebleminded, though she was neither epileptic nor mentally disabled. In the landmark decision, eight judges ruled that the state of Virginia had the right to sterilize her. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. wrote the majority opinion concluding, “Three generations of imbeciles are enough.” The decision resulted in 60,000 to 70,000 sterilizations of Americans considered “unfit” to reproduce. At the Nuremberg trials, lawyers for Nazi scientists cited the opinion in defense of their actions. We speak to Adam Cohen, author of “Imbeciles: The Supreme Court, American Eugenics, and the Sterilization of Carrie Buck.”

NERMEEN SHAIKH: We turn now to look at what’s been described as one of the worst Supreme Court rulings in history. In the 1927 case Buck v. Bell, the court upheld a statute that enabled the state of Virginia to sterilize so-called mental defectives or imbeciles. The person in question was Carrie Buck, a poor, young woman then confined in the Virginia State Colony for Epileptics and the Feebleminded, though she was neither epileptic nor mentally disabled. In the landmark decision, eight judges ruled that the state of Virginia had the right to sterilize her. Her mother, Emma, as well as Carrie’s daughter, Vivian, then only eight months old, were deemed similarly deficient. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. wrote the majority opinion concluding, quote, “Three generations of imbeciles are enough.”

AMY GOODMAN: The decision resulted in 60,000 to 70,000 sterilizations of Americans considered “unfit” to reproduce. The Supreme Court decision had its origins in the eugenics movement then thriving in the United States. The 1924 Immigration Act was passed with similar intent—to prevent immigration by genetically inferior groups, which included Italians, Jews, Eastern Europeans and countless others, in an attempt to improve the genetic quality of the American population.

Author Adam Cohen writes about the case in his new book, Imbeciles: The Supreme Court, American Eugenics, and the Sterilization of Carrie Buck. Adam was previously a member of The New York Times editorial board and a senior writer for Time magazine. He is the co-editor of TheNationalBookReview.com.

Adam Cohen, welcome back to Democracy Now! It’s great to have you with us.

ADAM COHEN: Great to be here, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: Tell us the story of Carrie Buck. In a moment, we’ll hear all about how it ties into immigration, eugenics, parallels to what we’re seeing today. But start back in the 1920s with Carrie Buck.

ADAM COHEN: So she’s a young woman who is growing up in Charlottesville, Virginia, being raised by a single mother. Back then, there was a belief that it was better often to take poor children away from their parents and put them in middle-class homes. So she was put in a foster family that treated her very badly. She wasn’t allowed to call the parents “mother” and “father.” She did a lot of housekeeping for them and was rented out to the neighbors. And then, one summer, she was raped by the nephew of her foster mother. She becomes pregnant out of wedlock. And rather than help her with this pregnancy, they decide to get her declared epileptic and feebleminded, though she was neither, and she’s shipped off to the Colony for Epileptics and Feebleminded outside of Lynchburg, Virginia.

AMY GOODMAN: And what happened to her there?

Democracy Now for more

Comments are closed.