The United States Once Sterilized Tens of Thousands —Here’s How the Supreme Court Allowed It

The United States Once Sterilized Tens of Thousands —Here’s How the Supreme Court Allowed It

On the morning of October 19, 1927, the Commonwealth of Virginia sterilized Carrie Buck. Dr. John Bell whose name would forever be linked with Carrie’s in the Supreme Court case Buck v. Bell cut her open and removed a section from each of her Fallopian tubes. In his notes, Dr. Bell noted that “this was the first case operated on under the sterilization law.”