Includes bibliographical references (pages 369-385) and index.
Contents
List of illustrations -- bk 1. Introduction -- 1. Prologue : A simple and painless procedure -- 2. An epic quest in the modern world -- bk. 2. Three generations of imbeciles -- 3. The purity of our women -- 4. A forgotten gravestone -- bk. 3. The sins of the fathers -- 5. Hottentots in Kantsaywhere-- 6. A city upon a hill -- 7. The hideous serpent of hopelessly vicious protoplasm -- 8. But, oh, alas for a youthful pride -- 9. Oh, the bliss of being a mother! -- 10. Citizens of the wrong type -- 11. Catechisms old and new -- 12. The making of a master race -- 13. Neighborly love and beyond -- 14. Harry's secret -- bk. 4. Generations lost -- 15. The palace of justice -- 16. "What they did to me was sexual murder" -- 17. Epilogue : The apex of civilization -- Acknowledgments -- Notes -- Index.
Summary
Examines eugenics in the early-twentieth-century U.S., describing the Supreme Court case "Buck v. Bell," which legalized forced sterilization, and discussing the forces behind and extent of the practice--more than sixty-five thousand people throughout the country were sterilized--and the influence of American racial theories on the Nazis.
