Graduation Year
2024
Document Type
Campus Only Senior Thesis
Degree Name
Bachelor of Arts
Department
Legal Studies
Second Department
Latin American Studies
Reader 1
Jennifer Groscup
Reader 2
Martin Vega
Terms of Use & License Information
Rights Information
© 2024 Lizabeth Betances
Abstract
This paper aims to analyze the legal context and cultural significance of Madrigal v. Quilligan, a class action civil rights lawsuit brought to the California Federal Court denouncing the nonconsensual sterilization of Mexican-American women as a racist and xenophobic practice. The court denied that any harm had been done or intended to these women and ruled in favor of the hospital. This paper will establish that since its creation this country has upheld a white supremacist agenda– an agenda that has employed forced sterilization as a tool of eugenics. The Madrigal v. Quilligan case is no anomaly: it is representative of larger white supremacist and eugenics history in the United States. The paper will also situate this case in the context of a larger movement for reproductive rights and argue that a race-sensitive approach must be prioritized for there to be any hope of true reproductive justice.
Recommended Citation
Betances, Lizbeth, "Uncovering Forced Sterilization in the Twentieth Century: How the Law Failed Marginalized Women in Pursuit of a White Supremacist Agenda" (2024). Scripps Senior Theses. 2318.
https://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/2318
This thesis is restricted to the Claremont Colleges current faculty, students, and staff.
