PSYCHIATRY AND THE LEGACIES OF EUGENICS PSYCHIATRY AND THE LEGACIES OF EUGENICS HISTORICAL STUDIES OF ALBERTA AND BEYOND EDITED BY FRANK W. STAHNISCH AND ERNA KURBEGOVIĆ Copyright 2020 © Frank W. Stahnisch and Erna Kurbegović Published by AU Press, Athabasca University 1200, 10011 – 109 Street, Edmonton, AB T5J 3S8 https://doi.org/10.15215/aupress/9781771992657.01 Cover design by Marvin Harder Interior design by Sergiy Kozakov Printed and bound in Canada Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Title: Psychiatry and the legacies of eugenics : historical studies of Alberta and beyond / edited by Frank W. Stahnisch and Erna Kurbegović. Names: Stahnisch, Frank, editor. | Kurbegović, Erna, 1984- editor. Description: Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20200213202 | Canadiana (ebook) 20200213210 ISBN 9781771992657 (softcover) | ISBN 9781771992664 (pdf) ISBN 9781771992671 (epub) | ISBN 9781771992688 (Kindle) Subjects: LCSH: Eugenics—History—20th century—Case studies. | LCSH: Eugenics—Canada, Western—History—20th century—Case studies. | LCSH: Eugenics—History—20th century. | LCSH: Eugenics—Canada, Western—History—20th century. | LCSH: Psychiatry—History—20th century. | LCSH: Psychiatry—Canada, Western—History—20th century. | LCGFT: Case studies. Classification: LCC HQ751 .P79 2020 | DDC 363.9/2—dc23 This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences, through the Awards to Scholarly Publications Program, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund (CBF) for our publishing activities and the assistance provided by the Government of Alberta through the Alberta Media Fund. This publication is licensed under a Creative Commons licence, Attribution– Noncommercial–No Derivative Works 4.0 International: see www.creativecommons.org. The text may be reproduced for non-commercial purposes, provided that credit is given to the original author. To obtain permission for uses beyond those outlined in the Creative Commons licence, please contact AU Press, Athabasca University, at [email protected]. https://doi.org/10.15215/aupress/9781771992657.01 “Eugenics Society Exhibit,” 1930, Photographs and Plans of Eugenics Society Exhibits, Eugenics Society Archive, London, SAEUG/G/30/40, Wellcome Library. Photograph courtesy of Wellcome Library. CONTENTS Foreword ix Guel A. Russell Acknowledgments xiii Prologue: Eugenics and Its Study xvii Robert A. Wilson List of Illustrations xxiii Introduction 3 1 John M. MacEachran and Eugenics in Alberta: Victorian Sensibilities, Idealist Philosophy, and Detached Efficiency 37 Henderikus J. Stam and Ashley Barlow 2 The Consequences of Eugenic Sterilization in Alberta 57 Douglas Wahlsten 3 The Involvement of Nurses in the Eugenics Program in Alberta, 1920–1940 87 Diana Mansell 4 The Alberta Eugenics Movement and the 1937 Amendment to the Sexual Sterilization Act 103 Mikkel Dack 5 Eugenics in Manitoba and the Sterilization Controversy of 1933 119 Erna Kurbegović 6 “New Fashioned with Respect to the Human Race”: American Eugenics in the Media at the Turn of the Twentieth Century 137 Celeste Tường Vy Sharpe 7 The “Eugenics Paradox”: Core Beliefs of Progressivism versus Relics of Medical Traditionalism—The Example of Kurt Goldstein 159 Frank W. Stahnisch 8 Too Little, Too Late: Compensation for Victims of Coerced Sterilization 181 Paul J. Weindling 9 Commentary One 199 Marc Workman 10 Commentary Two 209 Gregor Wolbring Conclusion: Lessons from the History of Eugenics 217 Appendix: Sexual Sterilization, Four Years Experience in Alberta 233 Notes 253 Bibliography 323 Contributors 369 Index 375 FOREWORD Guel A. Russell At the International Summit on Human Gene Editing in Washington, DC, held December 1–3, 2015, scientists advocated caution, declaring that the clinical implementation of gene editing would be “irresponsible” at present. They recommended proceeding with thoughtfulness and care “to assess the many scientific, ethical, and social issues associated with human gene editing” until there would be a broad societal consensus about the appropriateness of any proposed change.1 This was not sur- prising with such formidable editing tools of “unprecedented ease and precision” as CRISPR-Cas9 (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palin- dromic Repeats), which could alter human heredity and affect the germ line. Of particular note was a reference to being “part of a historical process that dates from Darwin and Mendel’s work in the 19th century” and the question that motivated the meeting: “How, if at all, do we as a society want to use this capability?”2 That historical process gave rise to “eugenics”—the devastating social movement of the first half of the twentieth century that emerged in the wake of the rediscovery in 1905 of Bohemian monk and naturalist Gregor Mendel’s (1822–84) genetic discoveries.3 How society manipulated that knowledge to create a pseudo-science sanctioned by medicine and the law embodies cautionary lessons. The present volume, Psychiatry and the Legacies of Eugenics: Historical Studies of Alberta and Beyond, provides a critical analysis of the consequences that resulted when genetics, psych- iatry, and deeply embedded societal biases and institutional self-interests converged. This approach contributes to a greater understanding of not only the historical complexity of the mechanisms that underlie eugenics ix https://doi.org/10.15215/aupress/9781771992657.01 but also the contemporary social issues that may arise from genetics. In the narrative process, the questions raised in the individual chapters and the continuous threads brought out in the introductory overview and conclusions by the editors are most timely. Eugenics is not a closed book of past history. It casts a long shadow over both science and society in the Western world and, in fact, also globally. Historically, the eugenics movement found in the emerging science of classical Mendelian genetics supportive evidence for the utopian theory of the Victorian polymath Francis Galton (1822–1911) of improving soci- ety through “selective breeding” of “hereditary genius.”4 In the United States, however, under the influence of Charles Davenport (1866–1944), the first director of the Eugenics Record Office at Cold Spring Harbor, New York, positive eugenics became negative “dysgenics.” The emphasis shifted to prevention of the breeding of those perceived as genetically “defective.” These were not only the inmates of institutions and the phys- ically disabled, but the socially and mentally inadequate, as well as the economically disadvantaged, consisting largely of women and children. Categorized by psychologists and psychiatrists as “unfit” or “degenerate,” ranked on the basis of intelligence quotient (IQ) tests,5 and diagnosed by neurologists and psychiatrists as “feeble-minded,” they were perceived as a parasitic burden on society and seen to pose a threat to the germ plasm (gene pool) as a whole.6 With heredity as the root cause, systematic control of reproduction through compulsory sterilization became a convenient solution to economic, social, moral, and behavioural problems, yet ignored their complexity. An important aim of the studies assembled in this book is to draw attention to the key role of psychiatrists and clinical psychologists in the interests of spurious societal and institutional benefit. Historically, they provided the ranking, the labels, and the justification to influence the law as to who would be segregated in institutions, involuntarily sterilized, or prevented entry, in the case of immigrants from eastern and south- ern Europe. Although the primary focus here is on the application of eugenic ideals to the mental health systems and psychiatric institutions in western Canada, the treatment of the subject balances individual experi- ences, specific cases, and comprehensive critical analyses place eugenics within a broader context of international links. The studies highlight how German-speaking psychiatrists and neurologists during the Nazi period x Foreword https://doi.org/10.15215/aupress/9781771992657.01 in Europe developed their eugenics programs based on preceding theor- ies from Victorian Britain and methodologies from North America. The contributors to this edited collection demonstrate how the basic eugenics assumptions, arguments, and forms of implementation (e.g., stigmatiz- ing labels, sexual segregation, compulsory sterilization) were continuous despite geographical, political, and cultural differences. It is highly significant that geneticists, and even ardent progressive eugenicists like Henry J. Muller (1890–1976), despite their enthusiasm for its utopian ideal, had quickly identified the eugenic fallacy in attributing social behaviour, economic, class, and gender differences to inborn causes and heritability, to the exclusion of environmental influences (such as eco- nomic depression), as well as its dependence on the subjective, unreliable evidence of “pedigree charts.”7 The increasing criticisms of eugenics views by geneticists and biologists for lack of scientific evidence did not halt the tragic consequences of, first, legalized compulsory sterilization in North America and, then, the elim- ination of those deemed “unworthy of life” in the euthanasia program of Nazi Germany.8 What gave rise to bioethics as a discipline was the need to safeguard against