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This week, the Vermont Legislature is taking up some long-overdue business. Ninety years ago, lawmakers authorized a eugenics program that allowed the state to sterilize and institutionalize people it deemed “unfit” or “defective.” In practice, the primary targets of this racist campaign were Indigenous people, French-Canadians, and people who were mixed-race, poor or disabled.
In the three decades of the so-called Vermont Eugenics Survey, there were 253 documented cases of sterilization, though the actual number may be far higher. The campaign of involuntary sterilization and family separation has had a lasting impact on targeted communities, particularly Vermont’s Native American people.
The House General and Military Affairs Committee is now hearing testimony in support of a joint resolution that would formally apologize for the sterilization program. Several dozen states had similar programs of sterilization in the last century. If the legislative resolution passes, it is believed that Vermont will become the first state to apologize for these actions.
This week’s guests are:
- Nancy Gallagher, an independent scholar and author of Breeding Better Vermonters: The Eugenics Project in the Green Mountain State. Her research and writing is also available on the Vermont eugenics website.
- Amanda Gokee, a reporter for VTDigger who is Native American and is covering the legislative resolution.
- Chief Don Stevens of the Nulhegan Abenaki Tribe in Vermont, whose family had personal experience with Vermont’s sterilization campaign.
- Rep. John Killacky, D-South Burlington, a legislative sponsor of the official apology.
“You need to apologize before you can fix something and heal it,” says Chief Stevens. “Until you recognize it, you’re either in denial or don’t want to face what happened.”
