One more reason not to trust your government

I suppose the idea of 'selective breeding' for humans has been around in some form or fashion for a very long time (eg the Spartans leaving 'lesser babies' to die or killing them out right); but it really got a boost from Charles Darwin.

When he set it up in lofty scientific tones, it took on a legitimacy. Margaret Sanger is on record as advocating contraception and abortion as ways to begin to eradicate not only mental illnesses but whole races. You can read the tracts of some abolitionists and see where the idea of eliminating blacks and Indians was a major part of their agenda.

The Fabian Socialists took this to another level. George Bernard Shaw is on record as wanting folks to give an accounting of their usefulness and if they couldn't, they were to be marched off to a humane death (yep, Shaw advocated the gas chamber 30+ years before Hitler put them into action) listening to lovely classical music.

If you'll Google 'eugenics tree' you should find a graphic from the 1880s or so about how wonderful eugenics is.

I teach this unit in high school history every year. We have some handicapped kids that the students are very fond of and when they realize that their friends and even some of them and their families are 'at risk' it really brings the lesson home.