Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. served on the United States Supreme Court for 29 years. Justice Holmes wrote many landmark opinions, particularly on the defense of free speech. A stain on his distinguished reputation was his adamant belief in the eugenics movement. These views were on public display in his majority opinion in Buck v. Bell. Buck v. Bell was a 1927 case involving forced sterilization laws. Carrie Buck was a young woman from Virginia who was deemed to be “feeble minded” due to unfortunate circumstances like poverty. Under Virginia law, she could be sterilized if it was authorized by medical authorities. Ms. Buck challenged the law and the case reached the Supreme Court. In one of the most infamous lines of a judicial opinion, Justice Holmes forcefully advocated for these types of laws: It is better for all the world if, instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind. The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes. Three generations of imbeciles are enough. Even his colleagues on the Court found these words to be harsh, but only one of them officially dissented. The idea of superior and inferior races was widely considered to be scientifically proven at the time. “Eugenics” was named by Francis Galton, who proposed that certain races and types of people were naturally inferior, and society should actively work to gradually eliminate them and promote genetically superior people instead. Doctor Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (Justice Holmes’ father) was not only an early proponent of Eugenics but had already produced his own scholarship on “ideal” breeding. Dr. Holmes believed that crime and poverty could be improved or eliminated by a society that actively controlled the population growth of “naturally deficient” people. Dr. Holmes was the Dean of Harvard Medical School, which was at the forefront of the American Eugenics movement not only in medicine but in education and legal scholarship. Justice Holmes was himself a Harvard undergraduate and law school graduate, as well as a law professor at Harvard before joining the judiciary. Given his background, it’s hardly surprising that Justice Holmes espoused the Eugenics movement. Justice Holmes believed that law evolved as society evolved; there were no fixed moral norms that undergird the legal system. If the law was to develop in a positive and proper way, it needed to reflect a society that also developed in the “right” direction. He believed government intervention was required to ensure people became more intelligent and prosperous. In this view, it was merely humane to prevent certain people from having children who would not meet these standards. Justice Holmes’ perspective on modern scientific theories intentionally informed his jurisprudence. The pseudo-science of Eugenics was debunked long ago, but the judicial opinions of Justice Holmes remain influential.