Eugenics

Eugenics refers to a scientific movement, at its height from the late 19th century through the 1930s, with the stated goal of improving the genetic constitution of humans. Eugenics enjoyed the support of a wide circle of social and intellectual elites and medical experts from across the political spectrum in many countries around the world. Viewed from today's perspective, the racialized overtones of the movement, which equated good genes with Northern European heritage, are obvious. Although the Nazi excesses in the name of eugenics destroyed the movement, modern technology has raised new concerns about genetic manipulation. This entry reviews the rise and fall of eugenics and outlines some contemporary issues.

The Movement's Origins

The term eugenics was coined in 1883 by Francis Galton, a cousin of Charles Darwin. Its meaning borrows from the Greek meaning “well-born” or “of good stock.” Eugenics established itself in a context marked by a strong belief in the power of heredity. Early eugenicists warned that the continued unconstrained breeding of the poor and “feeble-minded” would lead to the gradual deterioration of human genetic stock. The science was racialized in its expressed prediction that the spread of Negro blood through miscegenation and the “swamping” of native stock by “unfit” immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe would speed this deterioration and lead to the gradual demise of the White race.

Eugenicists believed that modern genetics held the promise of bettering the human race. At one time, orthodox genetics maintained that traits as varied as intelligence, criminality, epilepsy, and pauperism were governed by the existence of a single gene that could be traced, located, and bred up or out. Positive eugenics aimed to protect the “superior” race through the promotion of judicious breeding. Eugenicists warned the upper classes about the dangers of having too few children whereas poor people were having too many. It was deemed desirable to have people with higher intelligence breed with others of higher intelligence. By contrast, negative eugenics sought to mitigate the dangers posed by inherited defects and “inferior” races by limiting procreation by means of compulsory sterilization, enforcing strict immigration controls from countries [Page 473]with “inferior stock,” and eliminating populations that pollute the gene pool via genocide.

Buchenwald concentration camp. Slave laborers are shown in the Buchenwald concentration camp near Jena, Germany (April 16, 1945). The ultimate culmination of eugenicist thinking occurred in Nazi Germany, with the sterilization and extermination programs carried out by the Third Reich. Most people attribute the decline of eugenics after World War II to the moral and ethical objections resulting from the horrifying uses that Nazis made of eugenicist arguments.

Source: National Archives, 208-AA-206K-31.