Sterilized in the name of public health: Race, immigration, and reproductive control in modern California

American Journal of Public Health

Volumn 95, Issue 7, 2005, Pages 1128-1138

  Stern, Alexandra Minna ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ABORTION; CONTRACEPTION; CRIMINAL LAW; FOREIGN WORKER; GOVERNMENT; HUMAN; HUMAN RIGHTS; IMMIGRATION; INTRAUTERINE CONTRACEPTIVE DEVICE; LAW; LEGAL ASPECT; MEDICAL GENETICS; MENTAL PATIENT; ORAL CONTRACEPTION; POLITICAL SYSTEM; RACE; REVIEW; UNITED STATES; VASECTOMY;

GENETICS AND REPRODUCTION;

CALIFORNIA; CONTINENTAL POPULATION GROUPS; EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION; EUGENICS; FEMALE; HISTORY, 20TH CENTURY; HUMANS; MALE; MENTAL DISORDERS; PUBLIC HEALTH; STERILIZATION, INVOLUNTARY;

EID: 21144442364     PISSN: 00900036     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2105/AJPH.2004.041608     Document Type: Review

References (123)

1. Art Torres to Edmund G. Brown, Jr., September 7, 1979, Legislative History, Assembly Bill 1204, Microfilm 3:3 (57), California State Archives (CSA).
2. "Enrolled Bill Report," August 31, 1979, Legislative History, Assembly Bill 1204, Microfilm 3:3 (57), CSA;
3. California's Compulsory Sterilization Policies, 1909-1979, Lisa M. Matocq, ed. (Sacramento, Calif: Senate Publications; December 2003).
4. Author's interview with Art Torres, November 17, 2003, San Francisco, Calif.
5. These studies often focused on poor rural White families. See Nicole Hahn Rafter, White Trash: The Eugenic Family Studies, 1877-1919 (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1988).
6. Several weeks before California, the state of Washington passed the second sterilization law in the country. See Harry H. Laughlin, Eugenical Sterilization in the United States (Chicago: Psychopathic Laboratory of the Municipal Court, 1922).
7. Cited in Laughlin, Eugenical Sterilization, 17;
8. on Hatch, see Joel Braslow, Mental Ills and Bodily Cures: Psychiatric Treatment in the First Half of the Twentieth Century (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997).
9. See "Sterilization in California Institutions," Sixth Biennial Report of the Department of Institutions for the Year Ending June 30, 1932 (Sacramento: California State Printing Office [CSPO], 1932), 146-147.
10. Laughlin, Eugenical Sterilization, 18-19.
11. Ibid, 19;
12. also see F. O. Butler, "Sterilization Procedure and Its Success in California Institutions," Third Biennial Report of the Department of Institutions of the State of California, Two Years Ending June 30, 1926 (Sacramento: CSPO. 1926), 92-97. The "sexual perversion" aspect of the law was amended and clarified with a 1923 statute mat applied to those "convicted of carnal abuse of a female under the age of ten years."
13. Braslow, Mental Ills, 56.
14. Ezra S. Gosney and Paul Popenoe, Sterilization for Human Betterment: A Summary of Results of 6,000 Operations in California, 1909-1929 (New York: MacMillan, 1929).
15. This was followed 9 years later by Twenty-Eight Years of Sterilization in California (Pasadena, 1938).
16. Philip R. Reilly, The Surgical Solution: A History of Involuntary Sterilization in the United States (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991), chap. 4. Many of these rulings were delivered in the 1910s and prompted state legislatures to reword and resubmit successful sterilization statutes.
17. See Paul A. Lombardo, "Three Generations, No Imbeciles: New Light on Buck v. Bell" New York University Law Review 60 (1985): 30-62;
18. on sterilization in Virginia, also see Gregory Michael Dorr, "Segregation's Science: The American Eugenics Movement and Virginia, 1900-1980," PhD Dissertation, University of Virginia, 2000.
19. Quoted in Stephen J. Gould, "Carrie Buck's Daughter," Constitutional Commentary 2 (2) (1985): 333;
20. on Buck v. Bell, also see Paul A. Lombarde, "Involuntary Sterilization in Virginia: From Buck v. Bell to Poe v. Lynchburg," Developments in Mental Health Law 3 (3) (1983): 13-21;
21. Lombard, "Medicine, Eugenics, and the Supreme Court: From Coercive Sterilization to Reproductive Freedom," The Journal of Contemporary Health and Law Policy 13 (1996): 1-25;
22. also see Lawrence O. Gostin, Public Health Law: Power, Duty, Restraint (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000).
23. See Molly Ladd-Taylor, "Saving Babies and Sterilizing Mothers: Eugenics and Welfare Politics in the Interwar United States," Social Politics 4 (1997): 136-153.
24. Reilly, Surgical Solution, 97-101.
25. See Edward J. Larson, Sex, Race, and Science: Eugenics in the Deep South (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995).
26. Fred Hogue, "Social Eugenics," Los Angeles Times, July 5, 1936, 29.
27. Fred Hogue, "Social Eugenics," Los Angeles Times Sunday Magazine, March 9, 1941, 27.
28. Paul Popenoe and Roswell Hill Johnson, Applied Eugenics, 2nd ed. (New York: The MacMillan Company, 1933), 160-161.
29. Statistical Report of the Department of Institutions of the State of California, Year Ending June 30, 1942 (Sacramento: CSPO, 1943), 98;
30. California's Compulsory Sterilization Policies; Statistical Report of the Department of Institutions of the State of California, Year Ending June 30, 1935 (Sacramento: CSPO, 1936).
31. Figures derived from "US Maps Showing the States Having Sterilization Laws in 1910, 1920, 1930, 1940," Publication No. 5 (Princeton: Birthright Inc., nd) in California's Compulsory Sterilization Policies;
32. Clarence J. Gamble, "Preventive Sterilization in 1948," Journal of the American Medical Association 141 (11) (1949): 773;
33. Gamble, "Sterilization of the Mentally Deficient Under State Laws," American Journal of Mental Deficiency 51 (2) (1946): 164-169. Delaware was the only state that out-paced California in per capita terms in the 1930s, with a rate ranging between about 80 and 100 sterilizations per 100 000 individuals.
34. There are 4 key reasons for the immense difficulty of accurately calculating sterilization statistics and demographic trends: (1) incomplete archival access, including issues related to patient confidentiality; (2) insufficient clarity regarding the question of whether or not the official statistics include numerous "sent for sterilization only" cases, usually involving young women, not formally committed to state institutions but interned for the sole purpose of reproductive surgery; (3) exclusion in the official statistics of sterilizations in state prisons, 600 of which had been performed in San Quentin alone by 1941; (4) formidable numbers of "voluntary" sterilizations, primarily of women, who, at their own behest or that of relatives or a physician, procured the operation in a private setting. Undoubtedly, some women sought out sterilization as a form of permanent birth control, but the fact that obstetricians affiliated with California eugenics organizations carried out some of these operations raises questions about the extent to which they were voluntary, and, indeed, how to define voluntary or elective at this point in time.
35. See Gosney and Popenoe, Twenty-Eight Years of Sterilization in California.
36. "Nationality," Box 28, Folder 8, Papers of Ezra S. Gosney and the Human Betterment Foundation (ESGHBF), Institute Archives (IA), California Institute of Technology (CIT).
37. I b i d.
38. Percentages based on 1920 census figures. See "Table E-7. White Population of Mexican Origin, for the United States, Regions, Divisions, and States: 1910 to 1930," available at www.census.gov/documents/population, accessed May 10, 2004. California's total population was 3 264 711, of which Mexicans constituted 121 176.
39. "Norwalk Sterilizations," place of birth worksheet for females, Box 30, Folder 12; "Norwalk Sterilizations," place of birth worksheet for males, Box 30, Folder 13, ESGHBF, CIT, IA. Numbers and percentages derived from the Biennial Reports of the Department of Institutions from 1922 to 1930 (Sacramento: CSPO).
40. Excerpt of "Nationality," Box 28, Folder 8, ESGHBF, CIT, IA.
41. See rough draft of "Twenty-Eight Years of Human Sterilization," Box 28, Folder 8, ESGHBF, IA, CIT.
42. See unnamed patient records in Boxes 39-43, ESGHBF, IA, CIT. Also see Mike Anton, "Forced Sterilization Once Seen as a Path to a Better World," Los Angeles Times, July 16, 2003, A1.
43. For an excellent analysis of gender and sterilization in California, especially at the Sonoma facility, see Wendy Kline, Building a Better Race: Gender, Sexuality, and Eugenics From the Turn of the Century to the Baby Boom (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001).
44. See Alexandra Minna Stern, "The Darker Side of the Golden State: Eugenic Sterilization in California," in California's Compulsory Sterilization Policies.
45. "Background Paper" and "Sterilization Operations in California State Hospitals, April 26, 1909 through June 30, 1960," in California's Compulsory Sterilization Policies.
46. See Legislative History, Senate Bill 750, Microfilm 3:2(4);
47. "Legislative Memorandum," April 4, 1953, Legislative History, Assembly Bill 2683, Microfilm Reel 3:2 (10);
48. Frank F. Tallman to Honorable Earl Warren, March 31, 1953, Legislative History, Assembly Bill 2683, Microfilm Reel 3:2(10), CSA.
49. See "Background Paper," in California's Compulsory Sterilization Policies.
50. See Elof Axel Carlson, The Unfit: A History of a Bad Idea (Cold Spring Harbor, NY: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 2001);
51. Diane B. Paul, Controlling Human Heredity: 1865 to the Present (Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1995).
52. See Johanna Schoen, Choice and Coercion: Birth Control, Sterilization, and Abortion in Public Health and Welfare (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2005).
53. See Julius Paul, "The Return of Punitive Sterilization Proposals: Current Attacks on Illegitimacy and the AFDC Program," Law & Society Review 3(1) (1968): 77-106.
54. See Schoen, Choice and Coercion, chap. 2 and 3;
55. Leslie J. Reagan, When Abortion Was a Crime: Women, Medicine, and Law in the United States, 1867-1973 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997).
56. See Elena R. Gutiérrez, "Policing 'Pregnant Pilgrims': Situating the Sterilization Abuse of Mexican-Origin Women in Los Angeles County," in Women, Health, and Nation: Canada and the United States since 1945, ed. Georgina Feldberg, Molly Ladd-Taylor, Alison Li, and Kathryn McPherson (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2003), 379-403 (citation from p. 381).
57. See Thomas M. Shapiro, Population Control Politics: Women, Sterilization, and Reproductive Choice (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1985), 87.
58. Ibid, 113.
59. Gutiérrez, "Policing 'Pregnant Pilgrims,'" 381.
60. Shapiro, Population Control Politics, 115.
61. See Linda Gordon, Woman's Body, Woman's Right: Birth Control in America, 2nd ed. (New York: Penguin Books, 1990).
62. On abortion and mainstream feminism, see Ruth Rosen, The World Split Open: How the Modem Women's Movement Changed America (New York: Viking, 2000).
63. See Gordon, Woman 's Body, Woman's Right.
64. See Angela Y. Davis, Women, Race, & Class (New York: Vintage Books, 1981), chap. 12;
65. Jack Slater, "Sterilization: Newest Threat to the Poor," Ebony (October 1973): 150-156.
66. I b i d.
67. Ibid; "Treating 3 Million by 2005: Making It Happen: The WHO Strategy," available at http://www. unaids.org, accessed April 1, 2005.
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71. R. Macklin, "Ethics and Equity in Access to HIV Treatment-3 by 5 Initiative," background paper for the Consultation on Equitable Access to Treatment and Care for HIV/AIDS, World Health Organization, 2004, available at http://www.who.int/ethjcs/en/background-macklin3.pdf, accessed March 29, 2005;
72. N. Daniels, "How to Achieve Fair Distribution of ARTs in 3 by 5: Fair Process and Legitimacy in Patient Selection," background paper for the Consultation on Equitable Access to Treatment and Care for HIV/AIDS, World Health Organization, 2004, available at http://www.who.int/ethics/en/background- daniels3.pdf (accessed March 29, 2005);
73. Pro-Poor Health Policy Team, "'3 by 5,' Priority in Treatment, and the Poor," background paper for the Consultation on Equitable Access to Treatment and Care for HIV/AIDS, World Health Organization, 2004, available at http://www.who.int/ethics/en/background-pro-poor3.pdf (accessed March 29, 2005);
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76. C. Feudtner, Bittersweet: Diabetes, Insulin, and the Transformation of Illness (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003).
77. Ibid, 135,144,146,151.
78. For the history of penicillin rationing during World War II, see D.P. Adams, "The Greatest Good to the Greatest Number": Penicillin Rationing on the American Home Front, 1940-1945 (New York: Peter Lang, 1991).
79. Ibid, 70.
80. From the records of the Committee on Medical Research General Correspondence Files, quoted in Adams, "The Greatest Good to the Greatest Number," 71.
81. Adams, "The Greatest Good to the Greatest Number," 75.
82. Quoted in Adams, "The Greatest Good to the Greatest Number" 86.
83. Ibid, 74.
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85. H.M. Marks, "Cortisone, 1949: A Year in the Political Life of a Drug," Bulletin of the History of Medicine 66 (1992): 419-439.
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89. The lay members were a minister, a lawyer, a homemaker, a banker, a labor leader, a surgeon (who was not an expert in kidney disease), and a state government official. See Alexander, "They Decide Who Lives, Who Dies."
90. Ibid, 106.
91. Quoted in Fox and Swazey, The Courage to Fail, 232.
92. Alexander, "They Decide Who Lives, Who Dies," 106:
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