Sublime

40 percent were women of color—most of whom were African American.70 During the Jim Crow era, impoverished Black women in the Deep South were frequently subjected to hysterectomies or tubal ligations against their will and without their knowledge.

Laughlin’s credo was simple: “To purify the breeding stock of the race at all costs.” As journalist Edwin Black notes in his 2003 book, War Against the Weak, Laughlin’s plan of attack was threefold: “sterilization, mass incarceration and sweeping immigration restrictions.” In furtherance of these goals, Laughlin created the imposingly named,