In the early 1900s, the U.S. experienced a rise in eugenic legislation at the state level, but these laws were far from universally accepted. State legislatures shot down several attempts to pass eugenic sterilization laws. For example, Michigan failed to pass an 1897 law that would have mandated compulsory sterilization of “criminals” and “degenerates,” and in 1905, Pennsylvania’s governor vetoed “An act for the prevention of idiocy" that was passed by the state legislature. Throughout this decade, these bills began to take on a new meaning. The unsuccessful 1897 Michigan law was designed to be a punitive measure, whereas the 1905 Pennsylvania act was rooted in the idea that social inadequacy is heritable.
In 1907, after failed attempts across the country, Indiana passed the first eugenic sterilization statute in the United States. Dozens of states, including Connecticut in 1910, followed and almost all were based on the notion that “heredity plays a most important part in the transmission of crime, idiocy and imbecility.”
These laws throughout the early 1900s were brought about by emerging pro-eugenics organizing. During this decade, the first organized body for eugenics was established through the American Breeders’ Association (ABA). In 1906, the ABA created a Committee on Eugenics and began publishing articles in which they sought to equate the goals of bettering a crop or harvest to the human race. In 1910, Charles Davenport founded the Eugenics Record Office (ERO), which would become a leading influential organization for eugenic research, data collection, and policy-making until its closure in 1939. Wealthy philanthropists like John D. Rockefeller and John H. Kellogg funded the research, fieldwork, and pedigree collection of the ERO throughout the early 1900s.
