In 1924, the
Virginia General Assembly
The Virginia General Assembly is the legislative body of the Commonwealth of Virginia, the oldest continuous law-making body in the Western Hemisphere, the first elected legislative assembly in the New World, and was established on July 30, 161 ...
enacted the Racial Integrity Act. The act reinforced
racial segregation
Racial segregation is the systematic separation of people into race (human classification), racial or other Ethnicity, ethnic groups in daily life. Racial segregation can amount to the international crime of apartheid and a crimes against hum ...
by prohibiting
interracial marriage
Interracial marriage is a marriage involving spouses who belong to different races or racialized ethnicities.
In the past, such marriages were outlawed in the United States, Nazi Germany and apartheid-era South Africa as miscegenation. In 19 ...
and classifying as "
white
White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully reflect and scatter all the visible wavelengths of light. White on ...
" a person "who has no trace whatsoever of any blood other than
Caucasian
Caucasian may refer to:
Anthropology
*Anything from the Caucasus region
**
**
** ''Caucasian Exarchate'' (1917–1920), an ecclesiastical exarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Caucasus region
*
*
*
Languages
* Northwest Caucasian l ...
."
[Brendan Wolfe]
Racial Integrity Laws (1924–1930)
''Encyclopedia Virginia'' . The act, an outgrowth of
eugenist and
scientific racist
Scientific racism, sometimes termed biological racism, is the pseudoscientific belief that empirical evidence exists to support or justify racism (racial discrimination), racial inferiority, or racial superiority.. "Few tragedies can be more e ...
propaganda, was pushed by
Walter Plecker
Walter Ashby Plecker (April 2, 1861 – August 2, 1947) was an American physician and public health advocate who was the first registrar of Virginia's Bureau of Vital Statistics, serving from 1912 to 1946. He was a leader of the Anglo-Saxon Club ...
, a
white supremacist
White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other Race (human classification), races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any Power (social and polit ...
and eugenist who held the post of registrar of
Virginia
Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...
Bureau of Vital Statistics.
The Racial Integrity Act required that all
birth certificate
A birth certificate is a vital record that documents the birth of a person. The term "birth certificate" can refer to either the original document certifying the circumstances of the birth or to a certified copy of or representation of the ensuin ...
s and
marriage certificate
A marriage certificate (sometimes: marriage lines) is an official statement that two people are married. In most jurisdictions, a marriage certificate is issued by a government official only after the civil registration of the marriage.
In so ...
s in Virginia to include the person's
race
Race, RACE or "The Race" may refer to:
* Race (biology), an informal taxonomic classification within a species, generally within a sub-species
* Race (human categorization), classification of humans into groups based on physical traits, and/or s ...
as either "white" or "
colored
''Colored'' (or ''coloured'') is a racial descriptor historically used in the United States during the Jim Crow, Jim Crow Era to refer to an African Americans, African American. In many places, it may be considered a Pejorative, slur, though it ...
." The Act classified all
non-whites
The term "person of color" ( : people of color or persons of color; abbreviated POC) is primarily used to describe any person who is not considered "white". In its current meaning, the term originated in, and is primarily associated with, the U ...
, including
Native Americans, as "colored."
The act was part of a series of "racial integrity laws" enacted in Virginia to reinforce
racial hierarchies and prohibit the mixing of
races; other statutes included the Public Assemblages Act of 1926 (which required the racial segregation of all public meeting areas) and a 1930 act that defined any person with even a trace of
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
n ancestry as black (thus codifying the so-called "
one-drop rule
The one-drop rule is a legal principle of racial classification that was prominent in the 20th-century United States. It asserted that any person with even one ancestor of black ancestry ("one drop" of "black blood")Davis, F. James. Frontlin" ...
").
In 1967, both the Racial Integrity Act and the
Virginia Sterilization Act of 1924
The Virginia Sterilization Act of 1924 was a U.S. state law in Virginia for the sterilization of institutionalized persons "afflicted with hereditary forms of insanity that are recurrent, idiocy, imbecility, feeble-mindedness or epilepsy”. It ...
were officially overturned by the
United States Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
in their ruling ''
Loving v. Virginia
''Loving v. Virginia'', 388 U.S. 1 (1967), was a List of landmark court decisions in the United States, landmark civil rights decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that Anti-miscegenation laws in the United States, laws ban ...
''. In 2001, the Virginia General Assembly passed a resolution that condemned the Racial Integrity Act for its "use as a respectable, 'scientific' veneer to cover the activities of those who held blatantly racist views."
History leading to the laws' passage: 1859–1924
In the 1920s, Virginia's registrar of statistics, Dr.
Walter Ashby Plecker
Walter Ashby Plecker (April 2, 1861 – August 2, 1947) was an American physician and public health advocate who was the first registrar of Virginia's Bureau of Vital Statistics, serving from 1912 to 1946. He was a leader of the Anglo-Saxon Club ...
, was allied with the newly founded
Anglo-Saxon Clubs of America
The Anglo Saxon Clubs of America was a white supremacist political organization which was active in the United States in the 1920s, and lobbied in favor of anti-miscegenation laws and against immigration from outside of Northern Europe. Founded in ...
in persuading the
Virginia General Assembly
The Virginia General Assembly is the legislative body of the Commonwealth of Virginia, the oldest continuous law-making body in the Western Hemisphere, the first elected legislative assembly in the New World, and was established on July 30, 161 ...
to pass the Racial Integrity Law of 1924.
["Modern Indians A.D. 1800-Present"](_blank)
''First People: The Early Indians of Virginia'', Dept. of Historic Resources, State of Virginia, accessed 14 April 2010 The club was founded in Virginia by
John Powell of
Richmond
Richmond most often refers to:
* Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States
* Richmond, London, a part of London
* Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England
* Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada
* Richmond, California, ...
in the fall of 1922; within a year the club for white males had more than 400 members and 31 posts in the state.
In 1923, the Anglo-Saxon Club founded two posts in
Charlottesville
Charlottesville, colloquially known as C'ville, is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It is the county seat of Albemarle County, which surrounds the city, though the two are separate legal entities. It is named after Queen Cha ...
, one for the town and one for students at the
University of Virginia
The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United S ...
. A major goal was to end "
amalgamation
Amalgamation is the process of combining or uniting multiple entities into one form.
Amalgamation, amalgam, and other derivatives may refer to:
Mathematics and science
* Amalgam (chemistry), the combination of mercury with another metal
**Pan am ...
" by racial intermarriage. Members also claimed to support Anglo-Saxon ideas of fair play. Later that fall, a state convention of club members was to be held in Richmond.
The Virginia assembly's 21st-century explanation for the laws summarizes their development:
The now-discredited pseudo-science of eugenics
Eugenics ( ; ) is a fringe set of beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population. Historically, eugenicists have attempted to alter human gene pools by excluding people and groups judged to be inferior or ...
was based on theories first propounded in England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
by Francis Galton
Sir Francis Galton, FRS FRAI (; 16 February 1822 – 17 January 1911), was an English Victorian era polymath: a statistician, sociologist, psychologist, anthropologist, tropical explorer, geographer, inventor, meteorologist, proto- ...
, the cousin and disciple
A disciple is a follower and student of a mentor, teacher, or other figure. It can refer to:
Religion
* Disciple (Christianity), a student of Jesus Christ
* Twelve Apostles of Jesus, sometimes called the Twelve Disciples
* Seventy disciples in t ...
of famed biologist Charles Darwin
Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all species of life have descended fr ...
. The goal of the "science" of eugenics was to improve the human race by eliminating what the movement's supporters considered hereditary
Heredity, also called inheritance or biological inheritance, is the passing on of traits from parents to their offspring; either through asexual reproduction or sexual reproduction, the offspring cells or organisms acquire the genetic inform ...
disorders or flaws through selective breeding
Selective breeding (also called artificial selection) is the process by which humans use animal breeding and plant breeding to selectively develop particular phenotypic traits (characteristics) by choosing which typically animal or plant mal ...
and social engineering. The eugenics movement proved popular in the United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
, with Indiana
Indiana () is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. It is the 38th-largest by area and the 17th-most populous of the 50 States. Its capital and largest city is Indianapolis. Indiana was admitted to the United States as the 19th s ...
enacting the nation's first eugenics-based sterilization law in 1907.
In the following five decades, other states followed Indiana's example by implementing the eugenic laws.
Wisconsin
Wisconsin () is a state in the upper Midwestern United States. Wisconsin is the 25th-largest state by total area and the 20th-most populous. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake M ...
was the first state to enact legislation that required the medical certification of persons who applied for marriage licenses. The law that was enacted in 1913 generated attempts at similar legislation in other states.
Anti-miscegenation laws
Anti-miscegenation laws or miscegenation laws are laws that enforce racial segregation at the level of marriage and intimate relationships by criminalization, criminalizing interracial marriage and sometimes also sex between members of different R ...
, banning
interracial marriage
Interracial marriage is a marriage involving spouses who belong to different races or racialized ethnicities.
In the past, such marriages were outlawed in the United States, Nazi Germany and apartheid-era South Africa as miscegenation. In 19 ...
between whites and non-whites, had existed long before the emergence of eugenics. First enacted during the Colonial era when
slavery
Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
had become essentially a racial
caste
Caste is a form of social stratification characterised by endogamy, hereditary transmission of a style of life which often includes an occupation, ritual status in a hierarchy, and customary social interaction and exclusion based on cultura ...
, such laws were in effect in Virginia and in much of the United States until the 1960s.
The first law banning all marriage between whites and Blacks was enacted in the
colony of Virginia
The Colony of Virginia, chartered in 1606 and settled in 1607, was the first enduring English colonial empire, English colony in North America, following failed attempts at settlement on Newfoundland (island), Newfoundland by Sir Humphrey GilbertG ...
in 1691. This example was followed by
Maryland
Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...
(in 1692) and several of the other
Thirteen Colonies
The Thirteen Colonies, also known as the Thirteen British Colonies, the Thirteen American Colonies, or later as the United Colonies, were a group of Kingdom of Great Britain, British Colony, colonies on the Atlantic coast of North America. Fo ...
. By 1913, 30 out of the then 48 states (including all
Southern states) enforced such laws.
The Pocahontas exception
The Racial Integrity Act was subject to the Pocahontas Clause (or Pocahontas Exception), which allowed people with claims of less than 1/16
American Indian ancestry to still be considered white, despite the otherwise unyielding climate of
one-drop rule
The one-drop rule is a legal principle of racial classification that was prominent in the 20th-century United States. It asserted that any person with even one ancestor of black ancestry ("one drop" of "black blood")Davis, F. James. Frontlin" ...
politics.
The exception regarding Native
blood quantum
Blood quantum laws or Indian blood laws are laws in the United States that define Native American status by fractions of Native American ancestry. These laws were enacted by the federal government and state governments as a way to establ ...
was included as an amendment to the original Act in response to concerns of Virginia elites, including many of the
First Families of Virginia
First Families of Virginia (FFV) were those families in Colonial Virginia who were socially prominent and wealthy, but not necessarily the earliest settlers. They descended from English colonists who primarily settled at Jamestown, Williamsburg ...
, who had always claimed descent from
Pocahontas
Pocahontas (, ; born Amonute, known as Matoaka, 1596 – March 1617) was a Native American woman, belonging to the Powhatan people, notable for her association with the colonial settlement at Jamestown, Virginia. She was the daughter of ...
with pride, but now worried that the new legislation would jeopardize their status.
The exception stated:
It shall thereafter be unlawful for any white person in this State to marry any save a white person, or a person with no other admixture of blood than white and American Indian. For the purpose of this act, the term "white person" shall apply only to the person who has no trace whatsoever of any blood other than Caucasian; but persons who have one-sixteenth or less of the blood of the American Indian and have no other non-Caucasic blood shall be deemed to be white persons".
While definitions of "Indian", "colored" and variations of these were established and altered throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, this was the first direct case of whiteness itself being defined officially.
Enforcement
Once these laws were passed, Plecker was in the position to enforce them. Gov.
E. Lee Trinkle, a year after signing the act, asked Plecker to ease up on the
Indians and not "embarrass them any more than possible." Plecker responded, "I am unable to see how it is working any injustice upon them or humiliation for our office to take a firm stand against their intermarriage with white people, or to the preliminary steps of recognition as Indians with permission to attend white schools and to ride in white coaches."
Unsatisfied with the "Pocahontas Exception", eugenicists introduced an amendment to narrow loopholes to the Racial Integrity Act. This was considered by the Virginia General Assembly in February 1926, but it failed to pass. If adopted, the amendment would have reclassified thousands of "white" people as "colored" by more strictly implementing the "one-drop rule" of ancestry as applied to American Indian ancestry.
Plecker reacted strongly to the Pocahontas Clause with fierce concerns of the white race being "swallowed up by the quagmire of mongrelization", particularly after marriage cases like that of the Johns and Sorrels, in which the women of these couples argued that the family members listed as "colored" had actually been Native American because of historically unclear categorizing.
Implementation and consequences: 1924–1979
The combined effect of these two laws adversely affected the continuity of Virginia's American Indian tribes. The Racial Integrity Act called for only two racial categories to be recorded on birth certificates, rather than the traditional six: "white" and "colored" (which now included Indian and all discernible mixed race persons).
[Fiske, Part 1] The effects were quickly seen. In 1930, the
US Census for Virginia recorded 779 Indians; by 1940, that number had been reduced to 198. In effect, Indians were being erased as a group from official records.
In addition, as Plecker admitted, he enforced the Racial Integrity Act extending far beyond his jurisdiction in the segregated society.
[Fiske, Part 2] For instance, he pressured
school superintendents to exclude
mixed-race
Mixed race people are people of more than one race or ethnicity. A variety of terms have been used both historically and presently for mixed race people in a variety of contexts, including ''multiethnic'', ''polyethnic'', occasionally ''bi-ethn ...
(then called
mulatto
(, ) is a racial classification to refer to people of mixed African and European ancestry. Its use is considered outdated and offensive in several languages, including English and Dutch, whereas in languages such as Spanish and Portuguese is ...
) children from white schools. Plecker ordered the
exhumation
Burial, also known as interment or inhumation, is a method of final disposition whereby a dead body is placed into the ground, sometimes with objects. This is usually accomplished by excavating a pit or trench, placing the deceased and objec ...
of dead people of "questionable ancestry" from white cemeteries to be reinterred elsewhere.
Indians reclassified as colored
As registrar, Plecker directed the reclassification of nearly all
Virginia Indians
The Native American tribes in Virginia are the indigenous tribes who currently live or have historically lived in what is now the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States of America.
All of the Commonwealth of Virginia used to be Virgini ...
as ''colored'' on their birth and marriage certificates, because he was convinced that most Indians had African heritage and were trying to "
pass
Pass, PASS, The Pass or Passed may refer to:
Places
* Pass, County Meath, a townland in Ireland
* Pass, Poland, a village in Poland
* Pass, an alternate term for a number of straits: see List of straits
* Mountain pass, a lower place in a moun ...
" as Indian to evade
segregation Segregation may refer to:
Separation of people
* Geographical segregation, rates of two or more populations which are not homogenous throughout a defined space
* School segregation
* Housing segregation
* Racial segregation, separation of humans ...
. Consequently, two or three generations of Virginia Indians had their ethnic identity altered on these public documents. Fiske reported that Plecker's tampering with the vital records of the Virginia Indian tribes made it impossible for descendants of six of the eight tribes recognized by the state to gain federal recognition, because they could no longer prove their American Indian ancestry by documented historical continuity.
Involuntary sterilization
Historians have not estimated the impact of the miscegenation laws. There are records, however, of the number of people who were
involuntarily sterilized during the years these two laws were in effect. Of the involuntary sterilizations reported in the United States prior to 1957, Virginia was second, having sterilized a total of 6,683 persons (
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
was first, having sterilized 19,985 people without their consent). Many more women than men were sterilized: 4,043 to 2,640. Of those, 2,095 women were sterilized under the category of "Mentally Ill"; and 1,875 under the category "Mentally Deficient." The remainder were for "Other" reasons. Other states reported involuntary sterilizations of similar numbers of people as Virginia.
Leaders target minorities
The intention to control or reduce ethnic minorities, especially
Negro
In the English language, ''negro'' is a term historically used to denote persons considered to be of Black African heritage. The word ''negro'' means the color black in both Spanish and in Portuguese, where English took it from. The term can be ...
es, can be seen in writings by some leaders in the eugenics movement:
In an 1893 "open letter" published in the ''Virginia Medical Monthly'', Hunter Holmes McGuire
Hunter Holmes McGuire (October 11, 1835 – September 19, 1900) was a soldier, physician, teacher, and orator. McGuire was a surgeon in the Confederate Army attached to Stonewall Jackson's command, and he continued serving with the Army of North ...
, a Richmond
Richmond most often refers to:
* Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States
* Richmond, London, a part of London
* Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England
* Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada
* Richmond, California, ...
physician
A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...
and president of the American Medical Association
The American Medical Association (AMA) is a professional association and lobbying group of physicians and medical students. Founded in 1847, it is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Membership was approximately 240,000 in 2016.
The AMA's state ...
, asked for "some scientific explanation of the sexual perversion in the Negro of the present day." McGuire's correspondent, Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
physician G. Frank Lydston, replied that African-American men raped white women because of " reditary influences descending from the uncivilized ancestors of our Negroes." Lydston suggested as a solution to perform surgical castration
Castration is any action, surgical, chemical, or otherwise, by which an individual loses use of the testicles: the male gonad. Surgical castration is bilateral orchiectomy (excision of both testicles), while chemical castration uses pharmaceut ...
, which "prevents the criminal from perpetuating his kind.
In 1935, a decade after the passage of Virginia's eugenics laws, Plecker wrote to
Walter Gross, director of
Nazi
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
's Bureau of Human Betterment and Eugenics. Plecker described Virginia's
racial purity
The term racial hygiene was used to describe an approach to eugenics in the early 20th century, which found its most extensive implementation in Nazi Germany (Nazi eugenics). It was marked by efforts to avoid miscegenation, analogous to an animal ...
laws and requested to be put on Gross' mailing list. Plecker commented upon the
Third Reich
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
's sterilization of 600 children in the
Rhineland
The Rhineland (german: Rheinland; french: Rhénanie; nl, Rijnland; ksh, Rhingland; Latinised name: ''Rhenania'') is a loosely defined area of Western Germany along the Rhine, chiefly its middle section.
Term
Historically, the Rhinelands ...
(the so-called
Rhineland Bastards
Rhineland Bastard (german: Rheinlandbastard) was a derogatory term used in Nazi Germany to describe Afro-Germans, believed fathered by French Army personnel of African descent who were stationed in the Rhineland during its occupation by France a ...
, who were born of German women by Black French Colonial fathers): "I hope this work is complete and not one has been missed. I sometimes regret that we have not the authority to put some measures in practice in Virginia."
Despite lacking the statutory authority to sterilize Black,
mulatto
(, ) is a racial classification to refer to people of mixed African and European ancestry. Its use is considered outdated and offensive in several languages, including English and Dutch, whereas in languages such as Spanish and Portuguese is ...
and American Indian children simply because they were "colored", a small number of Virginia eugenicists in key positions found other ways to achieve that goal. The Sterilization Act gave State institutions, including hospitals, psychiatric institutions and prisons, the statutory authority to sterilize persons deemed to be "
feebleminded" — a highly subjective criterion.
Dr.
Joseph DeJarnette
Joseph Spencer DeJarnette (September 29, 1866 – September 3, 1957) was the director of Western State Hospital (located in Staunton, Virginia) from 1905 to November 15, 1943. He was a vocal proponent of racial segregation and eugenics, spec ...
, director of the
Western State Hospital in
Staunton, Virginia
Staunton ( ) is an independent city (United States), independent city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), U.S. Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 25,750. In Virginia, independent cities a ...
, was a leading advocate of eugenics. DeJarnette was unsatisfied with the pace of America's eugenics sterilization programs. In 1938, he wrote:
Germany in six years has sterilized about 80,000 of her unfit while the United States — with approximately twice the population — has only sterilized about 27,869 in the past 20 years. ... The fact that there are 12,000,000 defectives in the U.S. should arouse our best endeavors to push this procedure to the maximum ... The Germans are beating us at our own game.
By "12 million defectives" (a tenth of the population), DeJarnette was almost certainly referring to ethnic minorities, as there have never been 12 million mental patients in the United States.
According to
historian
A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the stu ...
Gregory M. Dorr, the
University of Virginia School of Medicine
The University of Virginia School of Medicine (UVA SoM) is the graduate medical school of the University of Virginia. The school's facilities are on the University of Virginia grounds adjacent to Academical Village in Charlottesville, Virginia. ...
(UVA) became "an epicenter of eugenical thought" that was "closely linked with the national movement." One of UVA's leading eugenicists,
Harvey Ernest Jordan, Ph.D. was promoted to dean of medicine in 1939 and served until 1949. He was in a position to shape the opinion and practice of Virginia physicians for several decades. This excerpt from a 1934 UVA student paper indicates one student's thoughts: "In Germany,
Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and then ...
has decreed that about 400,000 persons be sterilized. This is a great step in eliminating the racial deficients."
The racial effects of the program in Virginia can be seen by the disproportionately high number of Black and American Indian women who were given forced sterilizations after coming to a hospital for other reasons, such as childbirth. Doctors sometimes sterilized the women without their knowledge or consent in the course of other surgery.
Responses to the Racial Integrity Act
In the early twentieth century, minorities in everyday southern society feared to voice their opinions due to severe oppression. Magazines such as the ''
Richmond Planet'' offered the Black community a voice and the opportunity to have their concerns heard. ''The Richmond Planet'' made a difference in society by openly expressing the opinions of minorities in society. After the passing of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924 the ''Richmond Planet'' published the article "Race Amalgamation Bill Being Passed in Va. Legislature. Much Discussion Here on race Integrity and Mongrelization ... Bill Would Prohibit Marriage of Whites and Non-whites ..."Skull of Bones" Discusses race question.". The journalist opened the article with Racial Integrity Act and gave a brief synopsis of the act. Then followed statements from the creators of the Racial Integrity Act, John Powell and Earnest S. Cox. Mr. Powell believed that the Racial Integrity Act was needed as "maintenance of the integrity of the white race to preserve its superior blood" and Cox believed in what he called "the great man concept" which means that if the races were to intersect that it would lower the rate of great white men in the world. He defended his position by saying that non-whites would agree with his ideology:
The sane and educated Negro does not want social equality ... They do not want intermarriage or social mingling any more than does the average American white man wants it. They have race pride as well as we. They want racial purity as much as we want it. There are both sides to the question and to form an unbiased opinion either way requires a thorough study of the matter on both sides.
Carrie Buck and the Supreme Court
Racial minorities were not the only people affected by these laws. About 4,000
poor white
Poor White is a sociocultural classification used to describe economically disadvantaged Whites in the English-speaking world, especially White Americans with low incomes.
In the United States, Poor White (or Poor Whites of the South for ...
Virginians were involuntarily sterilized by government order. When Laughlin testified before the Virginia assembly in support of the Sterilization Act in 1924, he argued that the "shiftless, ignorant, and worthless class of anti-social whites of the South," created social problems for "normal" people. He said, "The multiplication of these 'defective delinquents' could only be controlled by restricting their procreation."
Carrie Buck
Carrie Elizabeth Buck (July 3, 1906 – January 28, 1983) was the plaintiff in the United States Supreme Court case ''Buck v. Bell'', after having been ordered to undergo compulsory sterilization for purportedly being "feeble-minded" by her fost ...
was the most widely known white victim of Virginia's eugenics laws. She was born in Charlottesville to Emma Buck. After her birth, Carrie was placed with foster parents, John and Alice Dobbs. She attended public school until the sixth grade. After that, she continued to live with the Dobbses, and did domestic work in the home.
Carrie became pregnant when she was 17, as a result of being
raped
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without their consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or agai ...
by the nephew of her foster parents. To hide the act, on January 23, 1924, Carrie's foster parents committed the girl to the
Virginia State Colony for Epileptics and Feebleminded
The Virginia State Colony for the Epileptics and Feeble Minded was a state run institution for those considered to be “Feeble-minded, Feeble minded” or those with severe mental impairment. The colony opened in 1910 near Lynchburg, Virginia in ...
on the grounds of feeblemindedness, incorrigible behavior and
promiscuity
Promiscuity is the practice of engaging in sexual activity frequently with different Sexual partner, partners or being indiscriminate in the choice of sexual partners. The term can carry a moral judgment. A common example of behavior viewed as pro ...
. They did not tell the court the true cause of her pregnancy. On March 28, 1924, Buck gave birth to a daughter, whom she named Vivian. Since Carrie had been declared mentally incompetent to raise her child, her former foster parents adopted the baby.
On September 10, 1924, Dr. Albert Sidney Priddy, superintendent of the Virginia State Colony for Epileptics and Feebleminded and a eugenicist, filed a petition with his board of directors to sterilize Carrie Buck, an 18-year-old patient. He claimed she had a mental age of 9. Priddy said that Buck represented a genetic threat to society. While the litigation was making its way through the court system, Priddy died and his successor, Dr. James Hendren Bell, came on the case.
When the directors issued an order for the sterilization of Buck, her guardian appealed the case to the
Circuit Court of
Amherst County. It sustained the decision of the board. The case then moved to the
Supreme Court of Appeals
The Supreme Court of Virginia is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It primarily hears direct appeals in civil cases from the trial-level city and county circuit courts, as well as the criminal law, family law and administrative ...
of Virginia, where it was upheld. It was appealed to the
U.S. Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
in ''
Buck v. Bell
''Buck v. Bell'', 274 U.S. 200 (1927), is a decision of the United States Supreme Court, written by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., in which the Court ruled that a state statute permitting compulsory sterilization of the unfit, including th ...
'', which upheld the order.
Justice
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (March 8, 1841 – March 6, 1935) was an American jurist and legal scholar who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1902 to 1932.Holmes was Acting Chief Justice of the Un ...
wrote the ruling. He argued the interest of "public welfare" outweighed the interest of individuals in
bodily integrity
Bodily integrity is the inviolability of the physical body and emphasizes the importance of personal autonomy, self-ownership, and self-determination of human beings over their own bodies. In the field of human rights, violation of the bodily in ...
:
We have seen more than once that the public welfare may call upon the best citizens for their lives. It would be strange if it could not call upon those who already sap the strength of the State for these lesser sacrifices, often not felt to be such by those concerned, in order to prevent our being swamped with incompetence. 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
The term ''imbecile'' was once used by psychiatrists to denote a category of people with moderate to severe intellectual disability, as well as a type of criminal.Fernald, Walter E. (1912). ''The imbecile with criminal instincts.'' Fourth edit ...
, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind. The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination
A vaccination policy is a health policy adopted in order to prevent the spread of infectious disease. These policies are generally put into place by State or local governments, but may also be set by private facilities, such as workplaces or sc ...
is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes.
Holmes concluded his argument with the phrase: "Three generations of
imbeciles
The term ''imbecile'' was once used by psychiatrists to denote a category of people with moderate to severe intellectual disability, as well as a type of criminal.Fernald, Walter E. (1912). ''The imbecile with criminal instincts.'' Fourth editi ...
are enough."
Carrie Buck was paroled from the Virginia Colony for Epileptics and Feeble-Minded shortly after she was sterilized. Under the same statute, her mother and three-year-old daughter were also sterilized without their consent. In 1932, her daughter Vivian Buck died of "enteric
colitis
Colitis is swelling or inflammation of the large intestine ( colon). Colitis may be acute and self-limited or long-term. It broadly fits into the category of digestive diseases.
In a medical context, the label ''colitis'' (without qualification) ...
."
When hospitalized for
appendicitis
Appendicitis is inflammation of the appendix. Symptoms commonly include right lower abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, and decreased appetite. However, approximately 40% of people do not have these typical symptoms. Severe complications of a rup ...
, Doris Buck, Carrie's younger sister, was sterilized without her knowledge or consent. Never told that the operation had been performed, Doris Buck married and with her husband tried to have children. It was not until 1980 that she was told the reason for her inability to get pregnant.
Carrie Buck went on to marry William Eagle. They were married for 25 years until his death. Scholars and reporters who visited Buck in the aftermath of the Supreme Court case reported that she appeared to be a woman of normal intelligence.
The effect of the Supreme Court's ruling in ''Buck v. Bell'' was to legitimize
eugenic sterilization
Compulsory sterilization, also known as forced or coerced sterilization, is a government-mandated program to Involuntary treatment, involuntarily Sterilization (medicine), sterilize a specific group of people. Sterilization removes a person's ca ...
laws in the United States. While many states already had sterilization laws on their books, most except for California had used them erratically and infrequently. After ''Buck v. Bell'', dozens of states added new sterilization statutes, or updated their laws. They passed statutes that more closely followed the Virginia statute upheld by the Court.
Supreme Court, repeals and apology: 1967–2002
In 1967 the US Supreme Court ruled in ''
Loving v. Virginia
''Loving v. Virginia'', 388 U.S. 1 (1967), was a List of landmark court decisions in the United States, landmark civil rights decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that Anti-miscegenation laws in the United States, laws ban ...
'' that the portion of the Racial Integrity Act that criminalized marriages between "whites" and "nonwhites" was found to be contrary to the guarantees of equal protection of citizens under the
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Fourteenth Amendment (Amendment XIV) to the United States Constitution was adopted on July 9, 1868, as one of the Reconstruction Amendments. Often considered as one of the most consequential amendments, it addresses citizenship rights and ...
. In 1975, the Virginia General Assembly repealed the remainder of the Racial Integrity Act. In 1979, it repealed the Sterilization Act. In 2001, the General Assembly overwhelmingly passed a bill (HJ607ER) to express the assembly's profound regret for its role in the eugenics movement. On May 2, 2002, Governor
Mark R. Warner issued a statement also expressing "profound regret for the commonwealth's role in the eugenics movement," specifically naming Virginia's 1924
compulsory sterilization
Compulsory sterilization, also known as forced or coerced sterilization, is a government-mandated program to involuntarily sterilize a specific group of people. Sterilization removes a person's capacity to reproduce, and is usually done throug ...
legislation.
See also
*
Eugenics in the United States
Eugenics, the set of beliefs and practices which aims at improving the genetic quality of the human population, played a significant role in the history and culture of the United States from the late 19th century into the mid-20th century. T ...
*
Immorality Act
Immorality Act was the title of two acts of the Parliament of South Africa which prohibited, amongst other things, sexual relations between white people and people of other races. The first Immorality Act, of 1927, prohibited sex between whites an ...
*''
Buck v. Bell
''Buck v. Bell'', 274 U.S. 200 (1927), is a decision of the United States Supreme Court, written by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., in which the Court ruled that a state statute permitting compulsory sterilization of the unfit, including th ...
'' (1927)
*
Virginia Sterilization Act of 1924
The Virginia Sterilization Act of 1924 was a U.S. state law in Virginia for the sterilization of institutionalized persons "afflicted with hereditary forms of insanity that are recurrent, idiocy, imbecility, feeble-mindedness or epilepsy”. It ...
References
External links
"Sterilization Act of 1924" by N. Antonios at the Embryo Project Encyclopedia Virginia's Indian People
Eugenics archive"HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 607, Expressing the General Assembly's regret for Virginia's experience with eugenics", Feb 14, 2001*
Racial Integrity Act of 1924, Original Text"Harry H. Laughlin" ''Model Eugenical Sterilization Law'', Harvard University
by Joe Heim, ''Washington Post'' March 20, 2017
by Joe Heim, ''Washington Post'', July 1, 2015
{{Authority control
1924 in American law
1924 in Virginia
Legal history of Virginia
Race legislation in the United States
Eugenics in the United States
Interracial marriage in the United States
Marriage law
Repealed United States legislation
African-American segregation in the United States
Native American segregation in the United States
African-American history of Virginia
Native American history of Virginia
History of racism in Virginia