Eugenics and the Nihilism of Law-and-Order Politics

This is the 16th installment in the Legacies of Eugenics series, which features essays by leading thinkers devoted to exploring the history of eugenics and the ways it shapes our present. The series is organized by Osagie K. Obasogie in collaboration with the Los Angeles Review of Books, and supported by the Center for Genetics and Society, the Othering & Belonging Institute, and Berkeley Public Health.

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IN MARCH 2021, Eric Nelson, the attorney representing Derek Chauvin—the former Minneapolis police officer who killed George Floyd in May 2020—delivered his opening remarks to the jurors:

The evidence will show that Mr. Floyd died of a cardiac arrhythmia that occurred as a result of hypertension, his coronary disease, the ingestion of methamphetamine and fentanyl, and the adrenaline flowing through his body—all of which acted to further compromise an already compromised heart.

With this statement, Nelson was attempting to sever the link between the actions of the state and their effects on Floyd’s body. He and his legal team were tacitly invoking an assumption prevalent during the early eugenics movement...