This continued until the Civil Rights Movement, when widespread critiques against society's "total institutions" dismantled popular acceptance for the state's forced sterilizations.

[7] Many of the powerful social workers, doctors, psychiatrists, and biologists, sought to hurt many of California's Mexican, Native American, and Asian populations through the exclusionary laws that those scientists proposed.

[14] Stanley's prison work concluded upon the start of World War II where he served overseas, only to retire as a eugenic pioneer.

Gosney set up the HBF and gathered 25 of the leading scientists, philanthropists, and community leaders to carry out research on the effects of sterilization for thirteen years (Valone).

[15] Gosney also used the HBF to distribute the product of his research, "Sterilization for Human Betterment", which attracted attention from the nearby university, the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).

Robert A. Millikan, a leading faculty member and proponent of Caltech, was looking for potential donors to the university and shared many of Gosney's views in his work decided to join the HBF board.The HBF asserted that sterilization was neither mutilation nor punishment, and it sought to dispel the widely held view that sterilization inhibited or increased sexual promiscuity.

It was revealed that nearly 10 million Americans had "eugenically undesirable children", and that it would take a single generation of vigorous sterilization to reduce the incidences of "mental abnormalities" by nearly 40%.

Rebecca M. Kluchin found while researching the case that "Physicians preferred to perform cesarean sections and tubal ligations in tandem to minimize risks associated with infection and anesthesia, as well as to reduce medical costs.

Karen Benker testified concerning discussions with then head of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Edward James Quilligan, in which he asserted that "poor minority women in L.A. County were having too many babies; that it was a strain on society; and that it was good that they be sterilized".

[8] Despite Benker's testimony and other corroborating evidence, Judge Jesse Curtis ruled in favor of the defendants, stating that there had been nothing more than "a breakdown in communication between the patients and the doctors" (Stern 1135).

Researchers estimated hundreds of Californians are alive who might hypothetically qualify before the December 2023 deadline, but reportedly as of early September 2023, only 101 applications had been approved, with seven cases closed as incomplete, and 339 denied.