California to compensate for forced sterilizations on women

(Brittany Murray/AP)

By Delilah Alvarado

(California) The state of California has decided to pay reparations to those who were sterilized under eugenics laws between 1909-1979, according to Reuters.

The legislation, called The Forced or Involuntary Sterilization Compensation Program will give 7.5 million compensate the survivors who went through the practice. The program was part of a budget deal signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday.

Eugenics involves preventing those who are considered mentally unstable or undesirable to stop reproducing as a way of "breeding out" undesirable traits and characteristics. The practice disproportionally targeted minorities and people of color, mainly Latinos in California.

"This is very much about acknowledging that there were wrongs committed by the state intentionally, against certain groups of people that were deemed unfit to reproduce or to be members of California society," said Laura Jimenez, director of California Latinas for Reproductive Justice, which worked five years for the legislation.

The supporters of the program cite recent headlines including women's healthcare gave them a political boost.

Last year a whistleblower called attention to a high rate of hysterectomies at immigration facilities, which Jimenez says fueled support for the bill.

California forcibly sterilized around 20,000 people, and an estimated 350 of them might still be alive. The California Victim Compensation Board will be reaching out to the survivors who will be compensated around $25,000 each.

California is the third state to give out reparations for sterilization after North Carolina and Virginia.

According to historians, the eugenics program in California inspired Nazi Germany's eugenics program.

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