e for survival and those who become rich and powerful are the 'fittest' while those left behind in the lower classes must necessarily be "less fit". Social Darwinists came to believe that that human progress depended on competition. It was believed that "Nature would provide that the best competitors in a competitive situation would win, and that this process would lead to continuing improvement" (Hofstadter 6). Darwin's theories on the "Survival of the Fittest", interpreted as Social Darwinism, were applied by the American people in the context of their social, economic and political development during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
             Darwinism exerted a profound effect upon America's social ideology. Darwin's theories played an important role in the American's usage of eugenics and in the justification of racial and sexist separateness. Eugenics, the study of human heredity, aimed at "improving" the human race, proved to be one of the most enduring aspects of Social Darwinism. Darwin's theory of natural selection had greatly stimulated the study of heredity. Early eugenicists accepted the identification of the "fit" with the upper classes and the "unfit" with the lower classes. They contributed the economic deceleration at the end of the century to the increased immigration from countries of "inferior" stock. The American Eugenics Society (A.E.S.), founded in 1924, supported the idea that the wealth and social position of the upper classes was justified by their superior genetic capabilities. They pushed sterilisation laws and laws that severely limited immigration into the U.S. from countries that were not racially "pure". Between 1911 and 1930, 24 states passed sterilisation laws aimed at the mentally retarded, criminals, and the insane ("Eugenics"). William E. Kellicot spoke for the majo...