Indiana Eugenics
Indiana was the first government in the world to pass a eugenic sterilization law. The state sterilized 2,500 people from 1907-to-1974. Indiana apologized for implementing the program earlier this year, on the 100th anniversary of its inception. A five-part news series on history of Eugenics in Indiana.
Latest Episodes
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Eugenics supporters believed they could improve society with sterilization and other progressive measures. Indiana enacted the first eugenic sterilization law in 1907. -
In the second installment of the five part series WFYI's Mary Hartnett explores how the state created it's sterilization program and the Supreme Court case that made sterilization legal. -
In part three of the series, a look at how the process worked and why the program finally ended. -
Indiana enforced a eugenic law that allowed institutions to sterilize the "mentally defective" until 1974. One woman sterilized by court order in 1971 is speaking up and telling her story. -
These days, a lot ethicists, scientists and sociologists say we are in a new eugenics era. In the final installment of the series, Mary Hartnett reports on how in-vitro fertilization and other assisted reproductive technologies may be a new kind of eugenics.
