"Beginning in 1909 and continuing for 70 years, California led the country in the number of sterilization procedures performed on men and women, often without their full knowledge or consent. Approximately 20,000 sterilizations took place in state institutions, comprising one-third of the total number performed in the 32 states where such action was legal."
-Andrea Estrada, at UC Santa Barbara (2015)
Introduction: Willis Lynch, For the Public Good (part 1). 2014. Youtube
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Sterilization became the preferred method of preventing "defective" genes from being passed down. Surgeons sterilized the "unfit,” usually without their knowledge.
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“It is just as sensible to imprison a person for feeblemindedness or insanity as it is to imprison criminals belonging to such strains. The question of whether a given person is a case for the penitentiary or the hospital is not primarily a legal question but one for a physician with the aid of studies of heredity and family histories.”
- Charles Davenport, Heredity in Relation to Eugenics (1911)
After being unwittingly sterilized, Cooper sued her mother and the surgeons that performed the procedure. Although she lost, awareness of sterilization spread.
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