ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes the social origins of the US eugenics movement, which advocated prevention of reproduction as a means of bringing the "unfit" under control. In the United States, the eugenics movement started in the 1870s, peaked in popularity about 1910, and began losing credibility about 1920. Past historians sometimes dismissed eugenics as a fad that attracted only a few ultra-conservative crackpots and had little impact on actual social policies. Members of the traditional middle class re-established their position partly by participating in the multipronged reform efforts that began after the Civil War and became known as "progressive". Some historians argue that when professional groups generated hereditarian theory, the result was to strengthen their claims to expertise in social problems. Eugenics offered practical solutions to problems with which social control workers struggled daily in their encounters with dependents, defectives, and delinquents.
