Article ID: CBB000932434

To What Extent Were Ideas and Beliefs about Eugenics held in Nazi Germany Shared in Britain and the United States Prior to the Second World War? (2004)

unapi

Wittmann, Emily (Author)


Vesalius
Volume: 10, no. 1
Issue: 1
Pages: 16-19

The term eugenics was first coined by Darwin's cousin, Francis Galton, in 1883.The eugenic movement gained public popularity across Europe and Nor th America at the end of the Victorian era, fuelled by the concept of 'social Darwinism' and public fear of a decline in the number of ideal citizens.The origins of eugenic legislation can be found in the USA's immigration acts of the early I880's. Indiana was the first state to pass sterilisation laws, in 1907.The laws that followed were used as templates by the Nazis, thirty years later. In Britain the Wood Committee (1924) and the Brock Committee (1931) both put pressure on parliament to introduce eugenic laws but were defeated.The antieugenics movement was stronger than in other protestant European countries and eugenics fell out of favour as the I930's progressed. In the USA however, support remained strong, leading one activist to comment in 1934, The Germans are beating us at our own game'. There appears to have been little emphasis on eugenics in the Weimar Parliament, but the Nazi's legislation, on coming to power in 1933, surpassed anything conceived on either side of the Atlantic at the outbreak of war in 1939.

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Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB000932434/

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Authors & Contributors
Weiss, Sheila Faith
Teicher, Amir
Weindling, Paul J.
Wecker, Regina
Sutton, Douglas G.
Shakespeare, Tom
Concepts
Eugenics
National Socialism
Science and politics
Science and race
Science and society
Human genetics
Time Periods
20th century, early
20th century
19th century
Places
Germany
United States
Great Britain
Southern states (U.S.)
England
Weimar Republic (1919-1933)
Institutions
Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut für Anthropologie, Menschliche Erblehre und Eugenik
Maxim Gorky Medical Genetics Institute (USSR)
Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Wissenschaften
Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena
Interessengemeinschaft Farbenindustrie Aktiengesellschaft
Eugenics Record Office, Cold Spring Harbor, New York
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