Honoring the memory of Carrie Buck.

Agreed to by the House of Delegates, February 1, 2002

Agreed to by the Senate, February 7, 2002

HEREAS, in 1924 Virginia passed two eugenics-related laws, the second of which permitted involuntary sterilization, the most egregious outcome of the lamentable eugenics movement in the Commonwealth; and

WHEREAS, under this act, those labeled “feebleminded,” including the “insane, idiotic, imbecile, feebleminded or epileptic” could be involuntarily sterilized, so that they would not produce similarly disabled offspring; and

WHEREAS, May 2, 2002, is the 75th anniversary of the United States Supreme Court decision in the case of Buck v. Bell, in which Virginia’s 1924 Eugenical Sterilization Act was allowed to stand; and

WHEREAS, following the Buck decision, an estimated 60,000 Americans, including about 8,000 in Virginia, were sterilized under similar state laws, and the decision was applauded by German eugenicists who supported comparable legislation early in the Nazi regime; and

WHEREAS, in 1927 Carrie Buck, a poor and unwed teenage mother from Charlottesville, was the first person sterilized under the provision of the 1924 law; and

WHEREAS, subsequent scholarship has demonstrated that the Sterilization Act was based on the now-discredited and false science of eugenics; and

WHEREAS, legal and historical scholarship analyzing the Buck decision has condemned it as an embodiment of bigotry against the disabled and an example of the use of faulty science in support of public policy; and

WHEREAS, that scholarship has also pointed out the fallacies contained in the Buck opinion, noting, among other points, that Carrie Buck’s daughter, Vivian, the supposed third-generation “imbecile,” later won a place on her school’s honor roll; and

WHEREAS, the General Assembly in 2001 expressed its “profound regret” over the Commonwealth’s role in the eugenics movement in this country and over the damage done in the name of eugenics; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED by the House of Delegates, the Senate concurring, That the General Assembly honor the memory of Carrie Buck on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the Buck v. Bell Supreme Court decision.

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HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 607

Expressing the General Assembly’s regret for Virginia’s experience with eugenics.

Agreed to by the House of Delegates, February 2, 2001

Agreed to by the Senate, February 14, 2001

WHEREAS, the now-discredited pseudo-science of eugenics was based on theories first propounded in England by Francis Galton, the cousin and disciple of famed biologist Charles Darwin; and

WHEREAS, the goal of the “science” of eugenics was to improve the human race by eliminating what the movement’s supporters considered hereditary disorders or flaws through selective breeding and social engineering; and

WHEREAS, the eugenics movement proved popular in the United States, with Indiana enacting the nation’s first eugenics-based sterilization law in 1907, closely followed by Connecticut; and

WHEREAS, in 1924 Virginia passed two eugenics-related laws, the first, the Racial Integrity Act, defined a white person as having no trace of black blood and made it illegal for whites and non-Caucasians to marry; and

WHEREAS, the second 1924 measure permitted involuntary sterilization, the most egregious outcome of the lamentable eugenics movement in the Commonwealth; and

WHEREAS, under this act, those labeled “feebleminded,” including the “insane, idiotic, imbecile, feebleminded or epileptic” could be involuntarily sterilized, so that they would not produce similarly disabled offspring; and

WHEREAS, in practice, the eugenics laws were used to target virtually any human shortcoming or malady, including alcoholism, syphilis and criminal behavior; and

WHEREAS, still another regrettable aspect of the eugenics laws was their use as a respectable,”scientific” veneer to cover activities of those who held blatantly racist views; and

WHEREAS, in a landmark 1927 decision, the United States Supreme Court upheld Virginia’s involuntary sterilization of Carrie Buck, in an 8-1 ruling written by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes; and

WHEREAS, from then until 1979, Virginia involuntarily sterilized some 8,000 people, with estimates of the precise number ranging from 7,450 to 8,300; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED by the House of Delegates, the Senate concurring, That the General Assembly expresses its profound regret over the Commonwealth’s role in the eugenics movement in this country and the incalculable human damage done in the name of eugenics; and, be it

RESOLVED FURTHER, That the General Assembly urge the citizens of the Commonwealth to become familiar with the history of the eugenics movement, in the belief that a more educated, enlightened and tolerant population will reject absolutely any such abhorrent pseudo-scientific movement in the future.

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The University of Heidelburg expressed its gratitude for the tireless efforts of Harry H. Laughlin in support of eugenics by awarding him an honorary doctorate for his “services on behalf of racial hygiene” on the occasion of the 550th anniversary of the university. This is the invitation received by Laughlin inviting him to attend.
photo credit: Courtesy of Special Collections, Pickler Memorial Library, Truman State University.

Exhibit 4.6b: Letters

Laughlin regretted that he was unable to accept the invitation to attend the ceremonies, but stood “ready to accept this very high honor” from “a nation which for many centuries nurtured the human seed-stock which later founded my own country.”
photo credit: Courtesy of Special Collections, Pickler Memorial Library, Truman State University.

Exhibit 4.6c: Letters

Laughlin writes that the conferring of the honor was “evidence of a common understanding of German and American scientists of the nature of eugenics… as those fundamental biological and social principles which determine the racial endowments and the racial health… of future generations.”
photo credit: Courtesy of Special Collections, Pickler Memorial Library, Truman State University.

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Efficiency rate chart from the Proceedings of the First National Conference on Race Betterment.
photo credit: Proceedings of the First National Conference on Race Betterment, 1913.

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Vivian’s first grade report card.
photo credit: Courtesy of Paul A. Lombardo.

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[3.1] Photograph of Carrie and Emma Buck at the Lynchburg Colony. Courtesy of M.E. Grenander Department of Special Collections, State University of New York at Albany.

Carrie Buck’s Story

As soon as Virginia’s Eugenical Sterilization Act was passed by the General Assembly in 1924, Virginia Colony officials selected 17 year old Carrie Buck of Charlottesville to test the law’s legality. Carrie Buck’s foster parents had committed her to the Virginia Colony shortly after she gave birth to an illegitimate child. The family’s embarrassment may have been compounded by the fact that Carrie’s pregnancy was the result of being raped by a relative of her foster parents. This point was never raised in the subsequent court proceedings. Carrie’s mother, Emma Buck, had previously been committed to the asylum.

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[3.2] Frank Buck and Emma Harlow’s marriage license, 1896. Courtesy of Paul A. Lombardo.

Officials at the Virginia Colony asserted that Carrie and her mother shared the hereditary traits of feeblemindedness and sexual promiscuity. With Emma and Carrie already institutionalized, if it could be demonstrated that Carrie’s daughter, Vivian, was likely to grow up to be an “imbecile” like her mother and grandmother, the case for inheritance of such a quality would be assured. After pushing for passage of a sterilization law in Virginia that would legally sanction procedures already taking place privately at the Virginia Colony, Superintendent Albert Priddy wanted a challenge to the law that would definitively strengthen its validity. The marriage license shows that Carrie’s mother, Emma, was married to Carrie’s father, Frank, ten years before Carrie’s birth although it was claimed that Carrie was an illegitimate child.

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[3.3] Carrie Buck’s pedigree: Most Immediate Blood-kin. Courtesy of Special Collections, Pickler Memorial Library, Truman State University.

This chilling rendering of Carrie Buck’s pedigree chart was found in Harry H. Laughlin‘s notes. It is done in the standard Eugenics Record Office format used to demonstrate the hereditary passage of undesirable traits.

Compulsory Sterilization at the Virginia Colony for the Epileptic and Feebleminded

[3.4] A collage of images of the boys and girls, young men and young women who resided at the Virginia Colony. Collage from “The Lynchburg Story,” a film distributed by Filmakers Library, produced in association with Discovery Networks/USA, producer, Bruce Eadie, director, Stephen Trombley, 1993.

When the Virginia Colony for the Epileptic and Feebleminded, located in Lynchburg, Virginia, opened its doors in 1910, it was the largest asylum in the United States. It was originally intended to be a home for epileptics, the mentally retarded, and the severely disabled. In 1912, Virginia Colony Superintendent Albert Priddy, lobbied the Virginia General Assembly for funds to expand the Colony to provide residential space for those deemed “feebleminded.”

Such a determination was subjective at best, but as asserted by Priddy, was considered an hereditary quality meriting segregation from the rest of society in order to prevent proliferation. The authorizing legislation specifically directed the admission of “women of child-bearing age, from twelve to forty-five years of age” as the first patients.

[3.45] Virginia order form for sterilization procedure. Courtesy of Paul Lombardo.

Soon the Virginia Colony, also known as the Lynchburg Colony and The Colony, became a collecting place for poor, uneducated, white Virginians who were regarded as “unfit” by the state. Once in the Colony, the intelligence of the inmates was assessed. Some attended school at the Colony while others received basic skill training. Some received neither. As the population of the Colony grew, Priddy began to focus on a way to prevent patient reproduction that was more cost effective than long-term segregation from the general population. In 1914, he contributed to a report to the General Assembly entitled Mental Defectives in Virginia, proposing large-scale institutional sterilization for Virginia’s feebleminded.

Prior to passage of Virginia’s Eugenical Sterilization Act of 1924, sterilization procedures had been taking place at the Virginia Colony, and were justified as “for the relief of physical suffering.” After the law was passed by the General Assembly, immediate targets of sterilization were the allegedly feebleminded women who were committed to the Colony, but hired out in servile positions to work for “normal” families.

In the pseudo-science of the eugenics movement, Albert Priddy found a home for his own sense of moralism and a justification that it was his right and his duty to determine who should and should not be allowed to reproduce. Included in his list were “anti-social morons,” prostitutes, and “non-producing and shiftless persons, living on public and private charity.”

Eugenic Social Theory Becomes Compulsory Sterilization Law

[3.5] Albert Priddy. Courtesy of Special Collections, Library of Virginia.

[3.5] Aubrey Strode. Courtesy of Special Collections, Library of Virginia.

[3.5] Irving Whitehead. Courtesy of Special Collections, Library of Virginia.

[3.6] Mrs. Alice Dobbs, the foster mother of Carrie Buck’s daughter Vivian, holds Vivian while flashing a coin past the baby’s face, in a test to assess her intelligence. The infant, perhaps distracted by the camera, didn’t follow the coin with her eyes and thus was declared an imbecile. A.H. Estabrook, the person who initiated this test of the infant’s intelligence and the photographer, took this picture the day before the Buck v. Bell trial in Virginia. Courtesy of M.E. Grenander Department of Special Collections, State University of New York at Albany.

Buck v. Bell: U.S. Supreme Court Upholds Virginia’s Eugenical Sterilization Law

[3.7] Photograph of J.H. Bell. Courtesy of Journal of Heredity, 1934.

[3.8] Photograph of the Halsey Jennings Building at the Lynchburg Colony, site of Carrie Buck’s sterilization. Courtesy of Paul A. Lombardo.

© 2004 Claude Moore Health Sciences Library

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photo credit: Courtesy of Special Collections, Pickler Memorial Library, Truman State University.

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photo credit: Courtesy of Paul A. Lombardo.

Exhibit 2.9b: Virginia’s Eugenical Sterilization Act of 1924

photo credit: Courtesy of Paul A. Lombardo.

Exhibit 2.9c: Virginia Sterilization Form

photo credit: Courtesy of Paul A. Lombardo.

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[5.1] Carrie Buck shortly before her death. Image from The Lynchburg Story, a film distributed by Filmakers Library, produced in association with Discovery Networks/USA, producer, Bruce Eadie, director, Stephen Trombley, 1993.

Carrie Buck after Her Involuntary Sterilization

“They done me wrong.
They done us all wrong.”

The legal test case resulting in Carrie Buck‘s involuntary sterilization was premised on the acceptance of a politically popular social policy that mistakenly labeled her as feebleminded. Her defense attorney worked with the attorney for the Virginia Colony to assure that Virginia’s sterilization law would be upheld in Court.

[5.2] Carrie Buck with her first husband, William Eagle. Both images with husbands from The Lynchburg Story.

[5.2] Carrie Buck with her second husband, Charlie Detamore, whom she married nearly 25 years after the death of her first.

Carrie Buck was paroled from the Virginia Colony shortly after her sterilization was performed. She married twice, but expressed later in life her sorrow that she had been unable to have additional children. She spent most of her adult life helping others. Her competence was obvious in the quality of care she gave to those who depended on her. After Carrie died in a nursing home in 1983 she was buried near the grave of her only child in Charlottesville, Virginia.

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[5.3] Vivian’s first grade report card. Courtesy of Paul A. Lombardo.

Bearing an illegitimate child provided the basis for allegations of promiscuity against Carrie Buck, when, in fact, her pregnancy resulted from a rape, allegedly by the nephew of her foster parents. Carrie’s daughter, Vivian, was raised by her foster parents until she died at the age of eight from an intestinal disease.

Records from Venable Elementary School in Charlottesville demonstrate that Vivian was not “feebleminded.” Her first grade report card showed that Vivian was a solid “B” student, consistently received an “A” in deportment, and had been on the honor roll.

Epilogue: 75 Years after Buck v. Bell, Virginia Expresses Regret for Its Role in Eugenics

Although the eugenics movement was eventually discredited as arising from political and social prejudice rather than scientific fact, few of the the legislative bodies that passed compulsory sterilization laws have ever compensated or apologized to the more than 60,000 victims. The United States Supreme Court affirmed Virginia’s sterilization law on May 2, 1927, in the Buck v. Bell decision, and the constitutionality of that ruling has never been challenged nor has the ruling ever been overturned. Virginia repealed the 1924 sterilization law in 1974, while compulsory sterilization of those with “hereditary forms of mental illness that are recurrent” was a part of the Virginia Code until 1979.

In the late 1990s, pressure was exerted on the Virginia State Assembly to acknowledge the injustice of the sterilization law after historians and reporters drew clear links between the Virginia law and the enthusiasm shown for eugenics by Nazi Germany.

Efforts to obtain an apology from the General Assembly were abandoned quickly as sponsors feared some lawmakers would resist. Even the proposed expression of regret drew opposition. One Senator referred to a “trend in this country to recreate history. Now we go back and stir the pot on history, and take the most unfortunate chapters in our history and try to relive them for no real reason.”

Stopping short of a full apology in 2001, the Virginia General Assembly with House Joint Resolution No. 607 expressed “profound regret” for the “incalculable human damage done in the name of eugenics.”

In January of 2002, House Joint Resolution No. 299 honoring the memory of Carrie Buck was passed by the General Assembly of the state that forcibly sterilized her 75 years previously. This resolution states that “legal and historical scholarship analyzing the Buck decision has condemned it as an embodiment of bigotry against the disabled and an example of using faulty science in support of public policy.”

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[5.4] Historical marker erected on May 2, 2002 Courtesy of Historical Collections, Claude Moore Health Sciences Library, University of Virginia.

An historical marker was erected on May 2, 2002 in Charlottesville, Virginia where Carrie Buck was born. At this time, Virginia Governor Mark R. Warner offered the “Commonwealth’s sincere apology for Virginia’s participation in eugenics,” noting that “the eugenics movement was a shameful effort in which state government never should have been involved.”

Both events took place at the urging of Paul A. Lombardo, Ph.D., J.D., who was the Director of the Program in Law and Medicine, Center for Biomedical Ethics, at the University of Virginia School of Medicine at the time this website was published. He has studied and written about Carrie Buck’s case for more than 20 years.

© 2004 Claude Moore Health Sciences Library

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Sir Francis Galton. Courtesy of the American Philosophical Society. [2.1]

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[2.2] Faces and Races, illustration from a eugenical text, Racial History of Mankind. Courtesy of Special Collections, Pickler Memorial Library, Truman State University.

[2.3] Harry H. Laughlin and Charles Davenport at the Eugenics Record Office. Courtesy of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Archives.

Pedigree Charts, American Eugenics Society, and Fitter Families

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[2.4] Kallikak family of New Jersey – Normal and Degenerate Lines
(enlarge to view additional eugenical pedigree charts). Courtesy of Paul Lombardo.

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[2.5] Eugenics Display: Some people are born to be a burden on the rest. Learn about heredity: you can help to correct these conditions. American needs less of these, more of these. Courtesy of the American Philosophical Society.

[2.6] Winners of Fittest Family Contest. Courtesy of the American Philosophical Society.

Harry H. Laughlin and Acts of 1924: U.S. Immigration Act, Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act, and Virginia’s Eugenical Sterilization Act

[2.7] Harry H. Laughlin photograph. Courtesy of American Philosophical Society.

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[2.8] Comparative Intelligence Chart. Courtesy of the American Philosophical Society.

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[2.9] Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act of 1924
(enlarge to view additional Virginia legislative acts). Courtesy of Special Collections, Pickler Memorial Library, Truman State University.

Laughlin also provided guidance in support of Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act, which made it illegal for whites in Virginia to marry outside their race. The act narrowly defined who could claim to be a member of the white race stating that “the term ‘white person’ shall apply only to such person as has no trace whatever of any blood other than Caucasian.” Virginia lawmakers were careful to leave an escape clause for colleagues who claimed descent from Pocahontas—those with 1/16 or less of “the blood of the American Indian” would also count as white.

The language of Laughlin’s Model Sterilization Act was used in Virginia’s Eugenical Sterilization Act to legalize compulsory sterilizations in the state. This legislation to rid Virginia of “defective persons” was drafted by Aubrey E. Strode, a former member of the Virginia General Assembly, at the request of longtime associate, Albert Priddy, who directed the Virginia Colony for the Epileptic and Feebleminded in Lynchburg, Virginia.

© 2004 Claude Moore Health Sciences Library

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