Human Heredity 9th Edition by Michael Cummings

Question

Human Heredity 9th Edition by Michael Cummings

Edition 9ISBN: 978-0538498821

Human Heredity 9th Edition by Michael Cummings

Edition 9ISBN: 978-0538498821

Exercise 1

In 1936, Fred Aslin and his eight brothers and sisters were sent to the Lapeer State School, a psychiatric institution in Michigan, after their father died and their mother was unable to care for her children. Neither Fred nor any of his siblings was mentally retarded or mentally ill. While he was institutionalized there, he and most of his siblings were labeled as feebleminded, and in 1944, at the age of 18, Fred was sterilized, as were three of his brothers and one of his sisters. After release from the institution, Fred became a farmer, served during the Korean War, and in 1996 filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act to obtain copies of his records from the Lapeer School. What he found in the files infuriated him, and he filed suit against the state of Michigan, seeking compensation for the forced sterilization he had undergone. In a March 2000 decision, the court ruled that the statute of limitations had expired, and he was denied compensation. Fred's case is similar to those of many of the 60,000 U.S. citizens forcibly sterilized between 1907 and 1979. Michigan was one of the leading states in the number of sterilizations performed. Four states have issued formal apologies for the use of forced sterilization, but none have offered to compensate those who were sterilized.
Do you think states should apologize to individuals who were sterilized in the name of eugenics?

Explanation

Verified

Definitions
The following terms are relevant to this problem.
Eugenics - is a movement based on a distortion on Darwin's evolutionary principles that only the fittest may survive. The movement considered people who weren't fit, such as retarded, homosexual, career criminals, etc. as undesirable and sought to limit their reproduction.
States should apologize for their use of sterilization to individuals under eugenics. The sterilization was against the individual liberties of these individuals. An apology by the state would help people understand the wrongs and moral failures of eugenics movement.