Scholars tend to agree the eugenics campaign grew out of that secular-millennial reform movement we discussed earlier. The Social Gospel began as an investigation into the causes of social ills, then shifted from focusing on individuals (in this case, “social degenerates,” who, if their nature was genetic, couldn’t even be reformed) to focusing on society (which could be reformed by removing certain genes from the pool). Many saw such goals as additionally helping “defects” themselves, in a this-is-for-your-own-good kind of way.
