Which Six American Presidents Have Been Associated with White Supremacy or Eugenics?
Plus, two bonus Presidents' history has yet to include
This isn’t my list, except for the last two. In my opinion, history has been far too kind in its retrospective assessment of its leaders. That’s part of the reason we can’t as a nation accept the premise of systemic racism until we realize how long our policies were created by and implemented by racists. None of these men acted alone; they were supported by advisors, lobbyists, scientists, businessmen, authors, filmmakers, Congress, and a willing Supreme Court. Some of the presidents I included are often tied to the eugenics movement, but not always considered racists. I don’t see the difference. In its narrowest definition, eugenics could only apply when considering class and health, but I’ve never seen it practiced when not including race. These leaders either openly defended white supremacy and eugenics or enacted policies that reinforced it:
Andrew Jackson (1829–1837) was the architect of the Indian Remo…
