E.S. Gosney

Ezra Seymour Gosney (November 6, 1855–September 14, 1942) was an American philanthropist and eugenicist. In 1928 he founded the Human Betterment Foundation (HBF) in Pasadena, California, with the stated aim "to foster and aid constructive and educational forces for the protection and betterment of the human family in body, mind, character, and citizenship," primarily through the advocacy of compulsory sterilization of the mentally ill and mentally retarded.

References

• "The Human Betterment Foundation," editorial reprinted from Eugenics, Vol. 3, No. 3: 110-113, in Collected papers on eugenic sterilization in California (Pasadena: Human Betterment Foundation, 1930).
• Edwin Black, "Eugenics and the Nazis -- the California connection", San Francisco Chronicle (9 Nov 2003). For the full Goethe quote, see also: http://www.waragainsttheweak.com/documentation.php.
• E.S. Gosney and Paul B. Popenoe, Sterilization for human betterment: A summary of results of 6,000 operations in California, 1909-1929 (New York: Macmillan, 1929).
• Stefan Kühl, The Nazi connection: Eugenics, American racism, and German National Socialism (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994). ISBN 0195082605
• Philip R. Reilly, "Involuntary sterilization in the United States: a surgical solution," The Quarterly Review of Biology, Vol. 62, No. 2. (June 1987): 153-170.