Subjectively Defective: American Jews, Disability, and Belonging in the Early 20th Century

Healthcare and Religion Lecture Hannah Zaves-Greene, PhD Author, Able to Be American: Disability in US Immigration Policy and the American Jewish Response Epilepsy. Heart disease. Varicose veins. “Feeble-mindedness.” In 1891, Congress unambiguously codified the popular sentiment that “defects” like these should preclude admission to the United States. Expanding the eugenics-rooted restrictions of the 1882 Immigration Act, the new law conflated illness, poverty, and disability with criminality and “moral turpitude,” starkly revealing Congress’s vision of the “ideal” American. Simultaneously, American Jews sought security and acceptance in the United States. In confronting this American culture of exclusion, rooted fundamentally in eugenic evaluations of immigrants’ bodies and minds, American Jewish women and men boldly asserted that they too had the right, knowledge, and ability to shape the meaning of American national belonging and, indeed, the fabric of the country itself. Continuing medical education credit will be available for those in attendance. Co-sponsored by the Department of Religious Studies, Jewish Studies Program, and Palliative and Supportive Institute Catalog of Opportunities Event