The Virginia Espino and Renee Tajima-Pena Collection of Sterilization records is a collection of legal records and court documents from the 1975 class action lawsuit Madrigal v. Quilligan. This lawsuit was brought to court by 10 Latina women against E.J. Quilligan M.D. and other hospital employees in regards to coerced sterilization of Latina women at Los Angeles County-University of Southern California Medical Center. While the ultimately judge ruled against the women, the lawsuit still increased public awareness about sterilization of minority women. Also included in this collection are Oral History Audio Recordings done by Virginia Espino documenting the interviews with prominent Latinas at the time of the court case and their involvement. Also included are interviews with a lawyer who supported the plaintiffs in the lawsuit and a doctor at the hospital who reported that minority women were being sterilized.
The court documents provide a very factual account of the court proceedings. The collection includes all the interrogatories as well as answers from the defendants and plaintiffs and other documents detailing the proceedings of the lawsuit. From these documents, one gets a comprehensive and non-biased narrative of the case proceedings given that they are all just reports and not subjective stories. The oral recordings give a very different historical narrative. These are personal accounts of people who were involved in the case. As a result, you’ll get a narrative that includes people’s feelings and different experiences that all show slightly different perspectives about the events of the case.
That being said, this collection is missing a large section of information. While there are 10 different tapes from individuals sympathetic to the plaintiffs, there are no interviews with those sympathetic to the defendants. This means that an entire perspective of the case is completely missing. Anyone trying to understand this lawsuit by looking at the information stored in this collection would have a significant bias towards the plaintiffs because the collection only includes interviews with people sympathetic to them. In order to remedy this, oral recordings should be made of Dr. E. J. Quilligan and other hospital employees who were involved in the case so that their perspectives can be included and considered. This collection also lacks interviews with the actual plaintiffs. While interviews with others involved in the case such as the lawyer and the doctor gives a more personal view of the lawsuit, having interviews with the actual women who were sterilized would provide more valuable information about the case.
Very insightful blog post! The organization of your post is really easy to follow and makes it easy for the reader to categorize the different trains of thought. It is really great how you point out that the collection allows for a more literal, unbiased view while still showcasing the different perspectives that encompass this complex topic. At the same time you make a very keen point by acknowledging that a whole perspective is left out by not including interviews with those sympathetic to the defendants. Overall, great post!
I really appreciated that you pointed out that one side of the case is completely missing. The title and content of this finding aid probably proves to be very salient and ethically controversial to most, and I agree that this compilation of documents is compromised due to its biased contents. I think that this is such a strong commentary on the power of arranged narratives. Subtle or purposeful absences of information can be extremely powerful and manipulative. In the task of exploring moral and ethical concerns, we as students of the digital humanities need to be that much more careful in checking our bias, despite the communities and narratives we agree with or aim to properly document.
I was interested in your observation regarding the lack of material that addresses the POV of the defendants in this case. Institutionalized Eugenics is still felt in certain quarters although the practice is purported to be discontinued. I think that you are on to something given that we have no solid understanding of the reason behind institutional and medical participation in these programs. Were doctors and nurses coerced into participation? Did they willingly volunteer their services? Did they have individual quotas and how did they feel about it? This is an good example of records and research giving rise to new questions. Well done.
I really enjoyed reading your blog post! It’s interesting that almost an entire perspective was left out of this data set… perhaps this affected the outcome of the case? I wonder if this was truly ALL of the information that the jury had to work with. Your perspective is objective and fair to both parties. I’m sure the date of this court case also affected the types of institutionalized prejudice in our court systems… this is something we can remedy through more information and data, such as the suggestions you provided for future reference.