The failure of town aid and later transition to the institutional system led many public and private state leaders to fear that the Vermonters who remained were not as strong as those who came before. These fears, alongside the apparent overwhelming of the institutional system at the turn of the twentieth century, led the state government to first consider eugenics under Governor John A. Mead in 1912. In the decades following, municipal and state governments worked together in a complex web that perpetuated eugenics—sometimes going unnoticed by unsuspecting eyes.
Building the foundation
Prior to the 1910s, there is no documented use of the term “eugenics” in Vermont legislative records or newspapers. But the Vermont government—local municipalities as well as state legislative, executive, and judicial branches—had already played a major role in building up the foundation of eugenics.
Over the nineteenth century, the different branches helped set up and run the town aid system and the state-run institutional system. For example, while the state legislature mandated town aid initially, local government oversaw the day-to-day functioning. Towns would continue to play an important role even after the state took over public welfare, with institutional officials notably complaining of municipalities’ abuse of the commitment system to send away people they didn’t like.
Municipal government
While municipal governments follow the same three branches of government, it’s important to also consider the role they played versus the state in Vermont. While Vermont eugenics drew off of the town aid system, it relied on mass institutionalization—which was established and overseen by the state legislature.
However, the law dictated that the local judicial systems had to commit people to the institutions: The state government and families typically could not send people by themselves. Local citizens, including doctors, could serve as witnesses, while others tried sometimes to stop commitments. Records point to consistent misuse of the institutionalization system, with municipalities committing people under false pretenses as the state took over public welfare payments following commitment. The scale of the issue is unknown—the records went uncorrected on the institutional side—but it was widespread and well known to the point that institutional officials often complained.
Local municipalities may sometimes have only been acting with thought to their budget, but that did not matter when institutional leaders were the state’s leading eugenicists. During the eugenics era, institutional leaders used these commitments to map out families, identify more victims, and argue that greater measures were needed.
During the Eugenics Survey of Vermont, municipal governments once more became a source of support for the Vermont eugenics movement. Some local officials, hearing of the organization’s purpose, turned away. Others turned over vital (e.g., birth, death certificates) and town aid records. To the Eugenics Survey’s great frustration, their fieldworkers soon found that commonplace natural disasters and poor recordkeeping had left many town records useless.
The state legislature
The state legislature stepped in only several times during the eugenics era, but with great and devastating impact. State eugenicists were highly successful in getting through laws that allowed substantial leeway in execution. However, it was always within the state legislature’s authority to exercise powers of oversight—which they ultimately chose not to do.
The state legislature’s first foray into eugenics began with the establishment of the institutional system. Though mass institutionalization theoretically preceded eugenics in the state, it established a database for later eugenicists and began to percolate similar ideas of segregation and elimination. Following its own system, the legislature was further responsible for receiving reports on the state-run institutions and granting funds from the state budget. Cases of abuse at the Waterbury Hospital were brought before the courts in 1896, and similar allegations as well as reports of mismanagement would dog the institution and others throughout their lifetimes.
In 1931, the state infamously passed a voluntary sterilization bill, allowing for the sterilization of those deemed and “idiot, imbecile, feeble-minded or insane person likely to procreate idiots, imbeciles, feeble-minded or insane persons” if they or a guardian consented to the surgery. The bill specifically bypassed a judicial process alongside several other major ethical considerations, and was not overturned for more than 40 years.
The legislature continued to participate in eugenics measures to varying degrees, establishing a a state board to survey “mentally defective” people in Vermont in the 1940s.
The state judicial branch
The state judiciary played little part in Vermont eugenics at the highest level; most relevant cases were settled in the local courts. Vermont’s eugenicists were only concerned over the constitutionality of one measure—sterilization. From the 1890s until Buck v. Bell (1927), states that did manage to pass laws often saw them soon struck down. Vermont avoided this scenario as the State Attorney General deemed a 1912 bill unconstitutional, leading to an executive veto. By the time the legislature did legalize sterilization, Buck v. Bell had settled the question altogether. The 1931 law was eventually struck down in 1980 for unconstitutionality; the case made it to the Vermont Supreme Court but was decided by the Rutland Superior Court.
Other measures, such as segregation and education, bypassed judiciary measures. The former relied on local courts for the initial commitment, but the established system left the length up to the institutional officials (with the exception of criminal cases). Public campaigns in education required no legislative action and judicial oversight.
The state executive branch
Several governors were involved at varying levels in the movement, both in their position as governor and outside of it. In several cases, more research is needed to determine their personal views on the matter and reasons for participating.
Governor John A. Mead (1910-12) was a fierce advocate for eugenical solutions, leading to the near-legalization of sterilization and the establishment of the Brandon Training School for the express purpose of segregation. Governor John E. Weeks (1927-31) participated in an extensive segregation and sterilization case prior to his term, supported various eugenics measures and the Eugenics Survey of Vermont as governor, and chaired the Vermont Commission on Country Life after. Governor Mortimer R. Proctor (1945-7) likewise joined the commission. Governor Philip H. Hoff (1963–1969) rejected eugenical measures proposed by a state commission on mental retardation (in a sign of the term falling out of use post-war, the commission did not use the word “eugenics”).
Resources
Gallagher, Nancy L. Breeding Better Vermonters: The Eugenics Project in the Green Mountain State. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1999.
de Guardiola, Mercedes. “‘Segregation or Sterilization’: Eugenics in the 1912 Legislative Session.” Vermont History 87, no. 1 (Winter/Spring 2019): 59-86.
de Guardiola, Mercedes. “Vermont for the Vermonters”: The History of Eugenics in the Green Mountain State. Barre: Vermont Historical Society, 2023.