The case of Buck v. Bell presented a prominent scenario in which states wanted to control the population by allowing people with only certain attributes or traits to reproduce. Carrie Buck of Virginia was sterilized in 1927 when the Supreme Court decided that she was ‘feebleminded’ and that she would only bear offspring that would be incapable of taking care of themselves, hence present social problems (Facing History and Ourselves, 2019). The case began in 1924 through the Virginia county courts, then the Appeal court before reaching the Supreme Court. Buck’s mother, Emma, was an inmate at the Lynchburg Colony for Epileptics and Feebleminded. She had separated with her husband when Buck was young, and taken her to foster care. It was under the foster care that Carrie Buck was raped and became pregnant when she was young. However, at school, her teacher had said she was a good student but due to her social background, her foster parents refused to educate her further. They wanted her to be sterilized because they believed she was feebleminded and would give birth to inferior children. At the time, most people believed in the eugenics theory, and everyone in the judicial system worked in collaboration to ensure that individuals that had a background similar to Buck’s were sterilized.
Eugenics is the social movement and philosophy, which suggests that it is possible to improve the society and the human race by encouraging the reproduction by people with ‘desirable’ traits while discouraging reproduction by people with ‘undesirable’ qualities. Believers of this philosophy were influenced by Charles Darwin’s natural selection theory, which advocated for the ‘survival of the fittest’ (Wilson, 2019). Therefore, by eliminating ‘inferior’ human beings, the human race will possibly improve because only people with ‘superior’ qualities are allowed to reproduce. The eugenics philosophy is related to Lombroso’s biological theory of crime. Cesare Lombroso based his theory on the perception that criminals have specific physiognomic abnormalities or features. Lombroso’s main objective was to help identify future criminals so that they could be isolated from the society. Lombroso suggested that criminals can be identified by the shape of their skulls, large cheekbones, asymmetry of the face and head, long arms, ears and lips, and a twisted nose. According to Lombroso, there was a standard way of how normal people appeared, and anyone who had abnormal features would likely become a criminal.
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Currently, eugenics or forced sterilization is illegal in all states in the United States. The practice was criticized heavily because of the alleged discrimination the practice was conducted. For instance, people were subjected to the practice for flimsy reasons such as being lazy or poor (Cussins, 2013). On the same note, people who were involuntarily sterilized came from poor social backgrounds. Eugenics received heavy criticism particularly during the Second World War when Hitler used the same philosophy to target a whole race, as well as the disabled. People who were deemed inferior were taken to concentration camps where they were tortured and killed. Some states in the U.S have offered compensation to some of the victims of the process.
Genetics should not be used should not be used to justify decisions such as the one involving Carrie Bucks. Firstly, reproduction is usually a natural process and sometimes people are born with defects they could not control. Secondly, using genetics to form legal decisions could lead to discrimination similar to that witnessed in the eugenics movement where poor and uneducated people were targeted. It also means that some people see themselves as superior, hence subject other people to their standards. In such a sense, the legal field will be contradicting itself with regard to what it seeks to represent; justice and fairness.
References
Cussins, J. (2013). Involuntary Sterilization Then and Now. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/genetic-crossroads/201309/involuntary-sterilization-then-and-now
Facing History and Ourselves. The Supreme Court and the Sterilization of Carrie Buck. https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/supreme-court-and-sterilization-carrie-buck
Wilson, P. (2019). Eugenics. https://www.britannica.com/science/eugenics-genetics
