Belle vs Buck

In 1927 the United States Supreme Court decided to affirm, by a vote of 8 to 1, the constitutionality of Virginia’s law that allowed states to enforce sterilization. Carrie Buck came from a family of young mothers. She was the eldest of three children and her father abandoned her mother not long into their marriage. She was then placed with foster parents as her mother was unable to look after her and was allegedly raped by their nephew, becoming pregnant at the age of 17. During the court case, Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. said “three generations of imbeciles are enough.”

The Court deemed her to be feebleminded and promiscuous and she was committed to the Virginia State Colony for Epileptics and Feeble-Minded, later having her sterilization there. The law allowing the procedure had been passed in 1924 after fifty years of scholarly debate over the matter.  It was believed that it would reduce social problems, including poverty and prostitution.

Sources:

http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/buck_v_bell_1927#start_entry