In 1927, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 8-1 that the Constitution permitted forced sterilization, leading to at least 80,000 procedures by the end of WWII. The hosts note that Nazi Germany modeled its 1933 sterilization laws on Harry Laughlin’s American model. Laughlin was even awarded an honorary degree from Heidelberg University in 1936 for his work on "purifying the germplasm," with some Americans expressing envy that Germany was applying these "conclusions of science" more aggressively.