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| "Your honor," says Comstock, "this woman gave birth to a naked child!" Political cartoon, The Masses, September, 1915 |
The following points were made in
the document:
The
Comstock Law of 1879 categorized the dissemination of information on birth
control as an obscenity. Half the states had enacted such obstructive laws, and
in so doing, no medical textbook which contained information on birth control
could be mailed within the United States without the threat of prosecution. There
was only one medical school (no name given) which the members of the Birth
Control Conference were aware of which educated to its students on
contraception.
Legal, medical, sociological, and
ethic paragraphs were given as logical reasons for birth control. A paragraph
was devoted to each one of these topics.
It was pointed out that the laws
that vary state-by-state are inconsistent and illogical. A comparison was made
between the laws in New Mexico which allowed doctors to advise patients on
birth control as they saw fit versus the Connecticut law under which women were
allowed to use any method at all for birth control.
A case was made for research in
methods of contraception. War, famine, and disease as a result of
overpopulation were addressed. There is a paragraph alluding to Eugenics, in
which the case was made for the possible compulsory sterilization of “unfit”
individuals. “The fact that some of the most unfit class of all – diseased and
defective and parasitic – will not use contraceptive information or cannot be
taught it, is a grave danger to the race” (p 3). This rather broad statement, however, does
not define specific criteria of who should be considered “unfit,” who would be
the ones to pass such judgment, or how this policy would be implemented. This
is a deeply complicated ethical issue which brings up questions about how class
and ethnicity were perceived by members of more privileged groups in society.
The statement that “the mother of a
growing family is presumably more valuable than one more child and should not
be sacrificed for such” (Ibid) is a relevant question which is still being
brought up today in political discussions regarding whether a women should get
an abortion if it would save her life.
The most striking part of this
document was the following quote: “We as men believe that if we had to undergo
sickness, disfigurement, limitation of activities, discomfort, pain, danger,
and sometimes death for the birth of a child, we would insist that it was our
absolute right to choose our own time for the process. Therefore, we believe
this an essential and absolute right of women and encourage them to claim such
right” (Ibid). This is followed by the signing of the document by eighteen men,
many of whom were doctors. To have so many men make such a strong and
passionate statement is truly significant, especially at a time when women were
typically expected to just look forward to motherhood and not concern
themselves with the health risks involved in pregnancy.
A prominent aspect of this document
is the statement by Dr. Irving F. Stein of the Michael Reese Hospital that “intelligent
women needed no means of information and help, but it was the ignorant women
who were much in need of assistance and active advice. The method to be
employed by the ignorant woman must be simple and effective.” However, nowhere
in the document was it delineated what particular standards applied to the
categories of ‘intelligent’ and ‘ignorant’. This statement may illustrate the
perception at the time, that intelligence was an innate quality which only
‘certain people’ posses (i.e. the middle- and upper-class), while the
working-class were viewed as ‘ignorant.’
Of particular interest is the speech
by Joseph L. Baer, a practicing obstetrician and gynecologist for twenty-five
years, in which he described being reprimanded by his seniors at Michael Reese
Hospital for giving lectures on birth control at a woman’s club (no name given)
and at the Drake Hotel. The paper mentioned that Dr. Baer had studied medicine
in Vienna and Berlin and was acquainted with the German laws concerning birth
control. Throughout the 1920s German law allowed for distribution and use of
birth control. Condoms and cervical caps were legal but expensive in Germany;
therefore, the most common form of birth control was coitus interruptus (Stephenson, 37).
This paper is representative of
other items in the collection because it addressed how contraception was viewed
in its day. The document mentioned that the American Birth Control League
received five thousand letters in one year asking for information on birth
control. Despite the public demand for such information, the Comstock Laws
still held doctors and patients alike captive for fear of fines and
imprisonment.
The early twentieth century was an
active period in the birth control movement. Mary Ware Dennett (1872-1947)
founded the National Voluntary Parenthood League in 1919 and was a prominent
birth control and sex education activist. Dennett utilized First Amendment
rights to discuss birth control and worked tirelessly to have birth control decriminalized
(Cott, 90).
Many doctors, nurses, and lecturers
were arrested under the similar violations of the Comstock Laws, most notably
Margaret Sanger (1879-1966); she played a pivotal role in the fight for the
right to distribute birth control information and pamphlets to the public. She
was arrested numerous times for violating the Comstock Laws and fought those
laws within the court system. She formed the American Birth Control League in
1921, and developed a different philosophy regarding birth control than
Dennett. Sanger initially had a more socialist stance, having worked as a nurse
in working-class communities, but she shifted to the eugenic standpoint of
better babies. She fought for the right of “doctors only” to distribute birth
control and educate the public on the matter. This stance garnered the American
Birth Control League great appeal among women in America; by 1926, the League
declared to have thirty-seven thousand members, with close to 90% being female
(Cott, 91).
Emma Goldman (1869-1940) was an
ardent supporter of Sanger. Goldman toured the United States speaking about
birth control options and distributing Sanger’s pamphlet Family limitation. Goldman’s lover, Ben Reitman, worked tirelessly
to promote birth control. Reitman was nicknamed “the Hobo Doctor” because of
his work with the downtrodden of society; the poor, the immigrants,
prostitutes, hobos, etc. In 1916, the couple was arrested for endorsing birth
control. Reitman served a six month sentence in jail, after which, the romantic
relationship with Goldman ended (Reitman papers, 1).
Sanger’s Family Limitation pamphlet caught the attention of Comstock. In
1915, she was found guilty of nine counts of violating the Obscenity Laws and
faced forty-five years in prison. This prompted her to escape to Europe,
leaving her husband, architect William Sanger, behind in New York. Mr. Sanger
was harassed by Anthony Comstock to disclose the whereabouts of his wife, to
which he staunchly refused (D’Emilio, 222).
Access to and knowledge about birth
control differed according to economic class and education. Sanger’s Clinical
Research Bureau conducted a survey of their clients and discovered that the most
urban working-class couples used the withdrawal method (coitus interruptus) as the most common form of birth control (no
numbers given). This method proved itself to be inadequate by the high
incidence of unplanned pregnancies and frequency of abortion, especially among
couples with less education. More than
half of the working-class women interviewed said they did not use any form of
birth control, whereas one third stated that they were “careful” with the
timing of intercourse and “stayed away” from their husbands. One woman said
that when she rejected her husband’s advances after the birth of their second
child, he abandoned the family (D’Emilio, 246).
There was also a noticeable
difference in use of birth control according to race. Of those couples who used
birth control, whites were prone to use the withdrawal method and condoms,
whereas black couples relied on female douching (D’Emilio, 247). This is interesting,
because I attended a Black Woman’s Health Conference about 10 years ago which
had a lecture discussing the high incidence of douching as a form of birth
control within the Black community. They touched upon the health risks of
douching and how ineffective it is as a birth control method. Douching has been
proven to destabilize the natural pH
level and culture of the vaginal environment, douching is deemed unhealthy by
the medical community. It increases the likelihood of contracting various infections,
one of which is PID (Pelvic Inflammatory Disease) (CDC).
The logic behind douching as a
method of contraception is based on the belief that sperm remains within the
vagina after intercourse. Although some ejaculate may still be present, most of
it has already passed through the cervical os before a douche can be utilized
and is already inside the uterus, thus inaccessible. Douching is still commonly
used in America, despite the health risks. It is estimated that 20 – 40 percent
of American women douche, mainly among African Americans, Hispanics and teens
(Douching).
There was one birth control advocate I researched who predated the
Comstock Laws of 1873; this was John Noyes (1811-1886), founder of the Oneida
Community. His birth control method of sex without ejaculation attracted
letters from thousands of people throughout the United States, thus prompting
him to write a pamphlet describing the technique and the sexosophy behind it in
Male Continence, which was first
published in 1872. This method was practiced among the Oneida Community since
it was founded in 1848. Unfortunately for Noyes, the Comstock laws came into
effect just a year later, prohibiting such material to be distributed to the
general public.
Noyes stated his sexosophy in the
following terms, “The mouth has three distinct functions, viz., those of
breathing, eating, and speaking. Two of these, breathing and eating, are purely
physical; and these we have in common with the brutes. The third function that
of speaking, is social, and subservient to the intellectual and spiritual. In
this we rise above the brutes. They are destitute of it except in a very
inferior degree. So, the two primary functions of the sexual organs - the
urinary and reproductive - are physical, and we have them in common with the
brutes. The third, viz., the amative, is social, and subservient to the
spiritual. In this again we rise above the brutes. They have it only as a bait
to the reproductive. As speech, the distinctive glory of man, is the superior
function of the mouth, so the social office of the sexual organs is their
superior function, and that which gives man a position above the brutes”
(Noyes, 12).
In closing, I found this document to
be an eye-opening window into the value systems of the time and I gained a
better understanding of the obstacles birth control advocates faced in their
struggle to make information on contraception accessible to the public. The
fact that we as a country are still battling some of the same issues nearly a
century later is striking. Access to birth control continues to be a heated
topic in the highest branches of government to this day. The question of
comprehensive sex education for teenagers is remains an unresolved issue,
despite the fact that America has the highest teenage pregnancy rates in the
industrialized world (Adolescent). It is remarkable how the more things change,
the more they stay the same.
Bibliography
Ben Reitman Papers, UIC Special
Collections, An inventory of the collection at the University of Illinois at
Chicago http://www.uic.edu/depts/lib/specialcoll/services/rjd/findingaids/BReitmanf.html
Birth
Control Conference Minutes held December 5, 1929, in: Chicago Women’s Aid
Records, Box 15, Folder 135, at University of Illinois at Chicago, Special
Collections
Center
for Disease Control and Prevention website, PID facts, http://www.cdcnpin.org/stdawareness/the-facts/english/06_PID_revd.pdf
Cott,
Nancy, F, The Grounding of Modern Feminism, Yale University Press, New
York, 1987
D’Emilio,
John, Freedman, Estelle, Intimate Matters: A History of Sexuality in America,
Perennial Library, New York, 1988
Noyes, John, Male
Continence, 1872, http://www.sacred-texts.com/sex/mc/mc02.htm
Singh, S,
Darroch, J E, Adolescent Pregnancy and Childbearing: Levels
and Trends in Developed Countries, Family Planning Perspectives, Volume 32, Number 1, January/February 1999
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