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Eugenic States

Margaret V. Clark and the “Importance of Parenthood”

In coverage about the “benefits” of better baby contests, Iowa newspapers often credited Dr. Margaret V. Clark as the woman who proposed using eugenic ideals to evaluate infants. In 1911, she spoke to a women’s club in Des Moines about this idea, arguing that “children should be scientifically ‘scored’ as well as horses, sheep, cattle, dogs, and various sorts of grain.” (“To Rear Perfect Babies,” Kansas City Star, 9 December 1911) As a result, the main feature of Better Baby Contests at the Iowa State Fair in August 1911 was the evaluation and scoring of infants by physicians and public health officials based on “scientific” standards for growth, appearance, and intelligence. Later that year, Clark traveled to Europe to learn more about eugenics, illustrating a wider network and reach for eugenicists beyond U.S. borders. Following her trip, she published several accounts of her experience and continued to bolster the use of eugenics in Iowa’s Better Baby Contests and public health programs.

The idea of wanting healthier babies is understandable. At face value, Better Baby Contests were a great way for parents to talk to medical professionals about their child’s health and receive advice and support if needed. However, it is important to keep in mind the underlying intent behind judging and evaluating infants for idealized qualities. Rather than pushing for improved social services or educational opportunities, one method Clark advocated for was preventing “unfit” individuals from marriage and procreation. In one address, she emphasized “‘How necessary it is that only health people mate for the protection of the race in order that the race may not deteriorate.’” (“Women Speakers at the Grand,” Fargo Forum and Daily Republican, 23 March 1914) This is why the idea of “positive” eugenics through initiatives like Better Baby Contests can be so dangerous.

One book Clark often recommended in her lectures, The Training of the Human Plant by Luther Burbank, highlighted the importance of marriage for eugenicists. As one chapter noted,

It would, if possible, be best absolutely to prohibit in every State in the Union the marriage of the physically, mentally and morally unfit. If we take a plant which we recognize as poisonous and cross it with another which is not poisonous and thus make the wholesome plant evil, so that it menaces all who come in contact with it, this is criminal enough. But suppose we blend together two poisonous plants and make a third even more virulent, a vegetable degenerate, and set their evil descendants adrift to multiply over the earth. (Luther Burbank, The Training of the Human Plant, 58–59)

This rhetoric, along with Clark’s own insistence and the work of other eugenicists, led to the proposal of a 1924 “Marriage Law” in Iowa, which required a physical examination of anyone who wanted to get married in the state. The Iowa legislature heavily debated the “eugenics clause” and what kind of examination would be required for those wishing to get married. Other states like North Carolina already had similar regulations in place. The bill “forbids issuance of license to wed ‘to any person who is an idiot or an imbecile, or who is under guardianship on account of being a person of unsound mind.’” (“Urges Provisions for Physical Test Before Marriage,” Evening Courier and Reporter, 24 January 1924) These arbitrary labels were frequently used during this time in Iowa and elsewhere to restrict the reproductive freedom of people and dictate who had the “right” to be together and have children. Clark emphasized this point in one of her many addresses in 1914. As she argued, it was “necessary … that only healthy people mate for the protection of the race in order that the race may not deteriorate.” (“Women Speakers at the Grand,” Fargo Forum and Daily Republican, 23 March 1914) The “race” that Clark saw as at risk for deterioration were wealthy Anglo Americans. Clark and other eugenicists like her used both marriage restrictions and Better Baby Contests as tools to maintain white supremacy.

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Will Study Eugenics [Headline contained by black rectangle border] Will Study Eugenics [/end of headline] [below the bordered headline, there is a black and white picture of Margaret V. Clark. She is facing toward the camera, but the left half of her face is obscured by shadow. She seems to be smiling and has a long collar that covers most of her neck. Her hair appears to be curled and pinned back.] [Caption] Dr. Margaret V. Clark of Waterloo, Ia. [/end of caption] [body text] WATERLOO, Ia., Nov. 30. – Dr. G. Hardy Clark and wife, Dr. Margaret V. Clark, will sail for Europe Dec. 12, where Mrs. Clark will make an especial study of eugenics, or the science of having children well born and healthily reared for the especial benefit of the Iowa Federation of Women’s clubs and the Iowa Mothers’ congress. The couple will be absent for six months and will spend the first four in the hospitals of Berlin in the general study of medicine. The last two months will be devoted to sighteeing and the study of social conditions, especially those relating to the welfare of infants. This trip will be in celebration of the twenty-fifth wedding anniversary of Drs. Clark. Dr. Margaret V. Clark, who was one of the first to suggest the scoring of babies as well as the scoring of cattle, hogs, horses, sheep and corn, believes sociological, hygienic and moral questions will be solved in the future when a perfect race of babies is brought into the world and properly reared. [end of body text]
Urges Provisions for Physical Test Before Marriage [Headline] Urges Provisions for Physical Test Before Marriage [End of Headline] [Small black line to border subhead] [Subhead] Senate Amendment Would Put Eugenics Clause in Iowa Marriage Law. [End of Subhead] [Small black line to border subhead] [Byline] (By the Associated Press) [End of Byline] Des Moines, Jan. 24. — An amendment to the marriage bill which would require every applicant for a marriage license in Iowa to undergo a physical examination was filed in the state senate this morning by Senators Gilchrist, Pochontas, and Holdoegel, Calhoun county. The amendment would put into the statute a “eugenics clause” which is, Senator Gilchrist says, “much the same as has been put into the marriage laws of a number of other states. North Carolina, he says, has in its laws the identical provisions which the amendment would put into the marriage laws of this state. Other states, the senator declared, require physical examinations much more stringent than this one, which would ascertain the freedom of the male applicant from infectious tuberculosis and venereal disease, and the freedom of the female applicant from infectious tuberculosis only. [Section head] Dated 10 Days Ahead. [End of section head] The certificate, the amendment provides, must have been executed within 10 days previous to the application for license to wed, and by “some reputable physician.” The law provides penalty for physicians making false statements, or for any clerk issuing a marriage license without complying with the provisions of the act. It further forbids issuance of license to wed “to any person who is an idiot or an imbecile, or who is under guardianship on account of being a person of unsound mind,” and provides that the clerk may require proof by affidavit or in some other satisfactory manner. One of the longest of the code bills before the special session of the legislature—that relating to the state fair board and other agricultural organizations which receive state financial aid—was taken up in the house this morning after two special orders were laid aside to permit the beginning of its consideration. [Section head] Requires Much Time. [End of section head] The entire session today, and possibly part of tomorrow’s session, it was indicated, would be designated to dispose of the measure, to which more than 30 amendments were proposed, either by the agricultural committee or individual members. Before taking up the bill, the house had passed the codifying bill relating to superior courts. It made only slight changes in the existing law under which such courts are held. Most of the committee amendments struck what were deemed useless phrases and words, while a group of them were designed to cut off, July 1, 1925, what had been permanent appropriations in the old law. [Section head] Gives Fair Secretary $5,000. [End of section head] The house adopted an amendment by Clemmons, Buchanan, to the amendment taking the limit off the salary of the secretary of state fair board and fixing the limit at $5,000, instead of the $4,000 fixed by the code commission in a clause which the committee sought to strike. It then voted down the amendment and left the salary limit at $4,000. It also adopted a committee amendment fixing traveling expenses of officials mentioned in the bill. The house refused to substitute an amendment by Parsons, Calhoun, for a committee amendment fixing the levying of a tax for the aid of county fairs. Parsons’ amendment would have struck the provisions for levying any county fair tax whatever.