My Country – Sterilization Laws In 1935, an Oklahoma law provided for sterilization of habitual criminals. A habitual criminal was as a person who was convicted two or more times for crimes “amounting to felonies involving moral turpitude.” Jack T. Skinner, had been convicted once for chicken-stealing and twice for armed robbery. The legislature passed the …
My Country – Douglas C. Macintosh Born in Canada, Douglas C. Macintosh went to the University of Chicago and then studied theology at Yale. During World War I, he served as a chaplain in the Canadian Army. But in the 1920s, he sought naturalization in the United States. However, they denied the application upon the …
My Country – The Legal Fiction of Corporate Personhood Not long after we ratified the Fourteenth Amendment, the Supreme Court extended it to corporations. At this time, jury selection continued to cause problems. Voting rights failed to truly reach African-Americans. But the Supreme Court gave equal protection and due process to corporations. Some things never …
My Country – Taking Clause On May 1, 1946, the Supreme Court heard an argument regarding the taking of private property. The Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution states: Nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation. Although in 1833, the Supreme Court held that the …
My Country – Truman Seizes the Steel Mills On April 8, 1952, President Harry S. Truman issued an executive order directing the Secretary of Commerce to take possession of most of the steel mills and nationalize them. The Supreme Court stepped in with Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579 (1952). Background on the …
My Country – Buck v. Bell, 274 US 200 (1927) On March 20, 1924, Virgina enacted a statute providing for the sexual sterilization of inmates found to have hereditary forms of insanity or “imbecility.” Carrie Buck The Virginia State Colony for Epileptics and Feebleminded opened in 1910. Although the Virginia Colony began sterilization procedures before the law “for the relief …