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During Adolf Hitler’s reign many American companies and scientist contributed towards advances in eugenic studies, are they to blame for the atrocities that occurred in the Second World War? It started in the late 1800s by Francis Galton who believed that to “raise the present miserably low standard of the human race breeding the best with the best” had to happen. Although the United States had a large amount of involvement, many European scientists and governments aided the research. In the late 1800s many rich businessmen and prior slave owners were most likely upset as slavery had been abolished, so through science they wanted to make Africans and Asians an inferior race. After World War II countless Nazi scientists were tried and punished for crimes against humanity, but were they really to blame for all eugenic crimes.
It was the early 1900s. The United States had abolished slavery almost a hundred years ago, although racism was still apparent, companies and institutions like the Rockefeller foundation, Carnegie Institution and Harriman Railroad Fortune greatly influenced and greatly funded Nazi Eugenic studies. Its almost ironic that a philanthropist company like the Rockefeller foundation was responsible for such crimes. By 1926 the philanthropic Rockefeller Foundation had donated some $400,000 which translates to 4 million dollars today, not only that but of the three fortune 500 all were in “league with some of America's most respected scientists hailing from such prestigious universities as Stanford, Yale, Harvard, and Princeton”. While they greatly funded overseas research companies like the Harriman Railroad Fortune were performing eugenic studies in the United States “the Harriman railroad fortune paid local...
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...an Roots of Nazi Eugenics” History news network, 1 september. 2003, Web.07 May 2014
Black, Edwin. "Hitler's Debt to America." The Guardian. Guardian News and Media, 06 Feb. 2004. Web. 14 May 2014.
Bardakjian, Kevork B. "Adolf Hitler -- Statement on the Armenian Genocide."Adolf Hitler -- Statement on the Armenian Genocide. Armenian National Institute, 1 Jan. 1985. Web. 15 May 2014.
Hitler,Adolf and Michael Ford. Mein Kampf.(Camarillo,California: Elite minds Inc, 2009.Print
Hitler, Adolf, and G. L. Weinberg. Hitler's Second Book. New York, NY: Enigma, 2003. Print.
Mandelbaum, Lia. "Hitler’s Inspiration and Guide: The Native American Holocaust | Sacred Intentions." Jewish Journal News. N.p., 18 June 2013. Web. 14 May 2014
"Second Seat of Government of the Third Reich and Place of Propaganda."Dokumentation Obersalzberg: Obersalzberg 1933. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 May 2014.
before he came to power, he just used World War II as his golden opportunity to turn his dream into a reality. Others, with Andreas Hillgruber, argue Hitler was the only reason genocide even happened. If Hitler had not been in control, the Holocaust would have ceased to exist. His key sources include the Nuremburg Trials, quoting him saying “this struggle will not end with annihilation of Aryan mankind, but with the extermination of the Jewish people of Europe.” By using Hitler’s own words against him, Hillgruber makes it easy to prove Hitler’s malicious intent clearly and depict him as the mastermind behind the mass murder of the Jewish population. Gerald Fleming creates the last sub-argument in his book, “Hitler and the Final Solution,” provides an in-depth historical evaluation of German fascism and the mechanization behind the Nazi Party bureaucracy. His main point of reference is David Irving’s, “Hitler’s War,”
The American Eugenics Movement was led by Charles Davenport and was a social agenda to breed out undesirable traits with an aim of racial purification. Eugenics was a used to breed out the worst and weakest to improve the genetic composition of the human race, and advocated for selective breeding to achieve this. The science of eugenics rested on simple mendelian genetics, which was a mistake because they were assuming complex behaviors could be reduced to simple mendelian genes. After Nazi Germany adopted the ideas behind the American eugenics movement to promote the Aryan race, the eugenics movement was completely discredited.
Gottfried, Ted, and Stephen Alcorn. Nazi Germany: The Face of Tyranny. Brookfield, CT: Twenty-First Century, 2000. Print.
This investigation will address the research question, to what extent was Germany’s post-World War I economic depression a causal factor in Hitler’s rise to power from 1919 to 1934? With the Treaty of Versailles, the German government was required to pay 132 billion gold marks of war reparations, drastically worsened with the US Wall Street crash. This effectively crippled the German economy and created a desperate people. For this investigation, Hitler’s private life history and pre-military career will not be analyzed. His political rise will be examined from the perspective of economic and social factors. Several primary sources will be explored, including the Hitler’s Mein Kampf and Hitler’s 25-Point Program. In addition, tertiary sources covering Hitler’s non-personal life and rise to power will be studied.
During the1930’s the Western economy was still in terrible shape from the Great Depression and the Stock Market Crash of 1929. “Evident instability – with cycles of boom and bust, expansion and recession - generated profound anxiety and threatened the livelihood of both industrial workers and those who gained a modest toehold in the middle class. Unemployment soared everywhere, and in both Germany and the United States it reached 30 percent or more by 1932. Vacant factories, soup kitchens, bread lines, shantytowns and beggars came to symbolize the human reality of this economic disaster.” (Strayer, 990) Like Germany, the Western democracies were economically in trouble and looking for stability and recovery. The United States’ response to the Great Depression, under Roosevelt, came in the form of the New Deal “which was an experimental combination of reforms seeking to restart economic growth. In Britain, France and Scandinavia, the Depression energized a democratic socialism that sought greater regulation of the economy and a more equal distribution of wealth, through peaceful means and electoral policies.” (Strayer, 993) The lack and need for restoration was clearly global. Hitler’s promise of civil peace, unity and the restoration of national pride would seem very appealing and very similar to the wants and needs of the Western democracies; but through peaceful means. No one was interested in or could afford setting off a heavily funded war by taking a stand against Hitler. Through a policy of appeasement allowing Hitler to take back land that was ordered dematerialized by the Treaty of Versailles, the British and the French tried to avoid all-out war but to no avail. Hitler continued his conquests eventually having most of Europe under Nazi control. A second war in Europe had
The T4 program was not the beginning of Germany’s effort to reach a super race. Leading up to the war Hitler enacted the “Law for the Prevention of Progeny with Hereditary Diseases” in the year of 1933. The law called for the sterilization of anyone that had any hereditary illnesses. The list of hereditary illnesses included: “schizophrenia, epilepsy, senile disorders, therapy resistant paralysis and syphilitic diseases, retardation, encephalitis, Huntington’s chorea and other neurological conditions.” (History Place) This law was enforced by opening 200 genetic health courts that would analyze the medical records of individuals and decide if they were to be sterilized or not. The sterilization of people usually involved the use of drugs, x-rays, or uterine irritants. Dr. Horst Schumann did a lot of these experiments with sterilization at Auschwitz, where he would take a group of men/women and would expose them to x-rays. Most of his experiments with x-rays were disappointing but he kept using this method. After he subjected his subjects to x...
Hitler, Adolf. “Mein Kampf.” The Human Record . By Alfred J. Andrea and James H. Overfield. Vol. 2. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2011. 2 vols. 401-404.
To solve this he made a new wave of propaganda “through newspapers, radios, and films” (“Introduction to Nazi Euthanasia”). The colorful commercials covered what would soon become the first mass murder program for the Nazi’s (“Euthanasia Program”). The commercials said that the “program would benefit society by not allowing “inferior people” to be produced and getting a lot more “superior people” in return” (“Introduction to Nazi Euthanasia”). The program was derived from Darwin’s Theories of Evolution (“Introduction to Nazi Euthanasia”). A new field of science called eugenics was created and helped to make the program seem more credible. Eugenics was defined as the “science of the improvement of the human race by better breeding” (“Introduction to Nazi Euthanasia”). The first eugenics institute was at the University College of London (“Introduction to Nazi Euthanasia”). The public believed that Euthanasia was a good thing and Hitler was able to put the killings into
Hitler’s Speech to the Reichstag 13th July 1934. Hitler’s Speech to the Reich Governors 6th July 1933. Rohm’s Newspaper Article, June 1933. Secondary Sources Bullock, ‘Hitler: A Study in Tyranny’, 1952.
The idea of eugenics was first introduced by Sir Francis Galton, who believed that the breeding of two wealthy and successful members of society would produce a child superior to that of two members of the lower class. This assumption was based on the idea that genes for success or particular excellence were present in our DNA, which is passed from parent to child. Despite the blatant lack of research, two men, Georges Vacher de Lapouge and Jon Alfred Mjoen, played to the white supremacists’ desires and claimed that white genes were inherently superior to other races, and with this base formed the first eugenics society. The American Eugenics Movement attempted to unethically obliterate the rising tide of lower classes by immorally mandating organized sterilization and race based experimentation.
Goldhagen, Daniel Jonah. Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust. New York: Vintage, 1997. Print.
"Science as Salvation: Weimar Eugenics, 1919–1933." United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. United States Holocaust Memorial Council, 10 June 2013. Web. 27 May 2014.
The main purpose of the book was to emphasize how far fear of Hitler’s power, motivation to create a powerful Germany, and loyalty to the cause took Germany during the Third Reich. During the Third Reich, Germany was able to successfully conquer all of Eastern Europe and many parts of Western Europe, mainly by incentive. Because of the peoples’ desires and aspirations to succeed, civilians and soldiers alike were equally willing to sacrifice luxuries and accept harsh realities for the fate of their country. Without that driving force, the Germans would have given up on Hitler and Nazism, believing their plan of a powerful Germany...
MODERN HISTORY – RESEARCH ESSAY “To what extent was Nazi Germany a Totalitarian state in the period from 1934 to 1939?” The extent to which Nazi Germany was a totalitarian state can be classed as a substantial amount. With Hitler as Fuhrer and his ministers in control of most aspects of German social, political, legal, economical, and cultural life during the years 1934 to 1939, they mastered complete control and dictation upon Germany. In modern history, there have been some governments, which have successfully, and others unsuccessfully carried out a totalitarian state. A totalitarian state is one in which a single ideology is existent and addresses all aspects of life and outlines means to attain the final goal, government is run by a single mass party through which the people are mobilized to muster energy and support.
Shmoop Editorial Team.” Adolf Hitler in World War 2.” Shmoop.com. Shmoop University, Inc., 11 Nov. 2008. Web. 26 Feb. 2014