Naira Matevosyan: Court Orders on Procreation

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Arch Gynecol Obstet (2016) 293:87–99 DOI 10.1007/s00404-015-3770-6

Author's Personal Copy

MATERNAL-FETAL MEDICINE

Court orders on procreation Naira R. Matevosyan1,2

Received: 10 December 2014 / Accepted: 27 May 2015 / Published online: 11 June 2015 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2015

Abstract Objective The aim of this study is to empirically evaluate judgments entered from 1913 to 2013 in the matters of compulsory sterilization. Methods Holdings and dispositions at the U.S. Appellate and Supreme courts are randomly located in LexisNexis using Shepard’s symbols. Continuous variables are processed with the Mantel–Haenszel method. Court orders are used as units of analysis. Results The majority of cases (56.4 %) concern minors at a mean age of 11.7 years. Forty-four (80 %) petitions are filed by the parents or guardians; 11 (20 %) are parens patriae. Petitions for female sterilization are denied in 56.4 % cases under the Federal Laws (2 U.S.C. 431; 28 U.S.C; 29 U.S.C; 42 U.S.C; 424 U.S.), Procedural due process clause of the 14th Amendment, statutes, and common law precedents. Petitions for female sterilization are granted in 36.4 % cases under the statutory penal codes, the Law of the land, precedents, and the dicta. No significant associations are found between the parity and degree of mental impairment (r = 0.342). Substantial correlations are met between the gender, degree of impairment (r2 = 0.724), and dispositions (r2 = 802). The mean age of women is 20.78 years; the mean age of men is 30.25 years. Correlations fail to establish reasoning between the age of the subjects and the entered judgments (r2 = 0. 356). Conclusions (1) The female/male ratio (8:1) and age gap of the respondents indicate on a disproportionate & Naira R. Matevosyan nmatevo@alum.emory.edu 1

New European Surgical Academy (NESA), Emory University, Atlanta, USA

2

Atlanta, GA, USA

impact of the statutes. (2) The procedure of sterilization in itself is incommensurate with equality, as the volume of surgery is uneven in males and females. (3) The case law is instructive with respect to which arguments have not been advanced. (4) Lastly, due to the etiological intricacy of mental impairment, with genetic transmission strikingly different in men and women, expertwitnesses ought to act in a medical vacuum because there is no mathematical certainty as to the transmission mode of the traits in question (exon and intron mutations, triplet repeat disorders, histone disorders, autosomal-dominant or autosomal-recessive transmission, sex chromosome-linkage, polygenomic imprinting, and organic reasons). Keywords Compulsory sterilization Courts Reproductive choices Procreative liberty

Introduction During the first half of the twentieth century more than 60,000 mentally impaired individuals, mostly residents of state institutions, were sterilized for eugenic reasons [1]. Nevertheless, the enacted mental hygiene did not decrease the prevalence of serious mental illnesses and developmental disorders in the United States. The onerous notion that women and men with cognitive impairment are unable to make meaningful decisions about their reproductive health or rights, often leads caretakers, states, and the courts to consider sterilization as a necessity. Quite often, courts do not explore factors influencing decisions of legal guardians filing for sterilization. Such factors may include property inheritance or intestate succession disputes, stigma, and misdiagnoses.

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