May 1927

In Buck v. Bell (1927), Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote for an 8–1 Supreme Court majority upholding Virginia's compulsory sterilization law: 'Three generations of imbeciles are enough.' The case involved Carrie Buck, falsely classified as 'feeble-minded' after being raped by her foster family's nephew and bearing a child. The ruling legitimized sterilization programs that would forcibly sterilize over 60,000 Americans, disproportionately Black, Indigenous, poor, and incarcerated people. The decision was never overturned; it remains technically valid precedent. Nazi Germany explicitly cited Buck v. Bell in defending its own sterilization program.

In Buck v. Bell (1927), Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote for an 8–1 Supreme Court majority upholding Virginia's compulsory sterilization law: 'Three generations of imbeciles are enough.' The ruling legitimized sterilization programs that would forcibly sterilize over 60,000 Americans, disproportionately Black, Indigenous, poor, and incarcerated people. The decision was never overturned; it remains technically valid precedent. Nazi Germany explicitly cited Buck v. Bell in defending its own sterilization program.

In 1927 the Supreme Court upheld compulsory sterilization of those deemed "unfit" — "three generations of imbeciles are enough" — opening the door to sterilizing tens of thousands of poor, disabled, and Black Americans.