Sterilization of Latinas

Puerto Rican women in particular have served as test subjects for various contraceptive studies in the United States[7], of which included involuntary sterilization. Many Puerto Rican women were sterilized from the 1930s to the 1970s in order to decrease poverty and population growth in Puerto Rico.[8] To decrease the population size of Puerto Ricans, a grant was given to the United States to provide free sterilizations at the workplaces of Puerto Rican women.[8] Though the sterilization was free, these women were often not given proper information about sterilization.[8]

In Los Angeles, between 1969–1973, Mexican and Chicana (Mexican-American) women were also disproportionately targeted by involuntary sterilizations. A number of these women would go on to join a class action lawsuit, Madrigal v. Quilligan, discussed below.

Many of these sterilizations were done involuntarily and without consent. Oftentimes, these women signed off on paperwork without being able to read the English language. Other times, they were told it was necessary in order to maintain their welfare benefits. It became common to sterilize women after giving birth whether by tubal ligation or hysterectomy. Even when the women did consent, it was often under false pretenses that the procedure could be reversed if they decided to have children again in the future.

Involuntary sterilization programs were in some instances supported and funded by the states. In California, the rationale for forced sterilization was primarily for eugenics purposes, although this later shifted to a fear of overpopulation and welfare dependency.[9]

California passed the third law in the United States that allowed state institutions to sterilize “unfit” and “feeble-minded” individuals. As eugenics gained credibility as a field in science, sterilization rates increased, especially after the 1927 Buck v. Bell U.S. Supreme Court decision, which upheld the constitutionality of sterilization laws in Virginia. According to available data, California performed one third of all reported sterilization procedures in the United States between 1910 and 1960.

Low-income minority women were more dependent on sterilization than other groups.[10] In a study conducted in El Paso, Texas groups of women were asked why they would choose sterilization; many of the top reasons included: not wanting any more children, their current age and health, plans of working or attending school or inability to afford another child.[10]

In the 1970s a group of Chicana women brought up a federal class action lawsuit against a hospital in Los Angeles County regarding their sterilizations.[11] Women in the class were allegedly given false information regarding sterilization.[11] The titular plaintiff, Dolores Madrigal, a Latina woman, was allegedly told several times by a medical professional that sterilization could be reversed.[11] Other women involved in the case signed consent forms for their sterilizations because they were allegedly sedated or manipulated by doctors and medical staff.[11] A common reason for forcing the sterilizations of these women was apparently the burden that their future children would be to “taxpayers.”[11] Many of the women did not discover that they had been sterilized until they visited a doctor.[11]

The judge deciding Madrigal held that it was a part of a doctor’s practice to provide sterilizations to these women based upon their cultural backgrounds.[11] The judge, Judge Curtis, stated in his ruling that miscommunication between the doctors and the women, rather than malice, resulted in the sterilizations.[11] In the words of his final comment, the judge stated, “One can sympathize with them for their inability to communicate clearly, but one can hardly blame the doctors for relying on these indicia of consent which appeared to be unequivocal on their face and which are in constant use in the medical center.”[11]