Margaret Sanger

(THEME)

VOICE ONE:

I'm Shirley Griffith.

VOICE TWO:

And I'm Sarah Long with the VOA Special English Program, People
in America. Today, we tell about one of the leaders of the birth
control movement, Margaret Sanger.

(THEME)

VOICE ONE:

Many women today have the freedom to decide when they will have
children, if they want them. Until about fifty years ago, women
spent most of their adult lives having children, year after year.
This changed because of efforts by activists like Margaret Sanger.
She believed that a safe and sure method of preventing pregnancy was
a necessary condition for women's freedom. She also believed birth
control was necessary for human progress.

VOICE TWO:

The woman who changed other women's lives was born in
Eighteen-Eighty-Three in the eastern state of New York. Her parents
were Michael and Anne Higgins.

Margaret wrote several books about
her life. She wrote that her father taught her to question
everything. She said he taught her to be an independent thinker.

Margaret said that watching her mother suffer from having too
many children made her feel strongly about birth control. Her mother
died at forty-eight years of age after eighteen pregnancies. She was
always tired and sick. Margaret had to care for her mother and her
ten surviving brothers and sisters. This experience led her to
become a nurse.

Margaret Higgins worked in the poor areas of New York City. Most
people there had recently arrived in the United States from Europe.
Margaret saw the suffering of hundreds of women who tried to end
their pregnancies in illegal and harmful ways. She realized that
this was not just a health problem. These women suffered because of
their low position in society.

Margaret saw that not having control over one's body led to
problems that were passed on from mother to daughter and through the
family for years. She said she became tired of cures that did not
solve the real problem. Instead, she wanted to change the whole life
of a mother.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

In Nineteen-Oh-Two, Margaret married William Sanger. They had
three children. Margaret compared her own middle-class life to that
of the poor people she worked among. This increased her desire to
deal with economic and social issues. At this time, Margaret Sanger
became involved in the liberal political culture of an area of New
York City known as Greenwich Village. Sanger became a labor union
organizer. She learned methods of protest and propaganda, which she
used in her birth control activism.

Sanger traveled to Paris, France, in Nineteen-Thirteen, to
research European methods of birth control. She also met with
members of Socialist political groups who influenced her birth
control policies. She returned to the United States prepared to
change women's lives.

VOICE TWO:

At first, Margaret Sanger sought the support of leaders of the
women's movement, members of the Socialist party, and the medical
profession. But, she wrote that they told her to wait until women
were permitted to vote. She decided to continue working alone.

One of Margaret Sanger's first important political acts was to
publish a monthly newspaper called The Woman Rebel. She designed it.
She wrote for it. And she paid for it. The newspaper called for
women to reject the traditional woman's position. The first copy was
published in March, Nineteen-Fourteen. The Woman Rebel was an angry
paper that discussed disputed and sometimes illegal subjects. These
included labor problems, marriage, the sex business, and revolution.

Sanger had an immediate goal. She wanted to change laws that
prevented birth control education and sending birth control devices
through the mail.

VOICE ONE:

The Woman Rebel became well-known in New York and elsewhere. Laws
at that time banned the mailing of materials considered morally bad.
This included any form of birth control information. The law was
known as the Comstock Act. Officials ordered Sanger to stop sending
out her newspaper.

Sanger instead wrote another birth control document called Family
Limitation. The document included detailed descriptions of birth
control methods. In August, Nineteen-Fourteen, Margaret Sanger was
charged with violating the Comstock Act.

Margaret faced a prison sentence of as many as forty-five years
if found guilty. She fled to Europe to escape the trial. She asked
friends to release thousands of copies of Family Limitation. The
document quickly spread among women across the United States. It
started a public debate about birth control. The charges against
Sanger also increased public interest in her and in women's issues.

(MUSIC)

VOICE TWO:

Once again, Margaret Sanger used her time in Europe to research
birth control methods. After about a year, she decided to return to
the United States to face trial. She wanted to use the trial to
speak out about the need for reproductive freedom for women.

While Sanger was preparing for her trial, her five-year-old
daughter, Peggy, died of pneumonia. The death made Sanger feel very
weak and guilty. However, the death greatly increased public support
for Sanger and the issue of birth control. The many reports in the
media caused the United States government to dismiss charges against
her.

VOICE ONE:

Margaret Sanger continued to oppose the Comstock Act by opening
the first birth control center in the United States. It opened in
Brownsville, New York in Nineteen-Sixteen. Sanger's sister, Ethel
Byrne, and a language expert helped her. One-hundred women came to
the birth control center on the first day. After about a week,
police arrested the three women, but later released them. Sanger
immediately re-opened the health center, and was arrested again. The
women were tried the next year. Sanger was sentenced to thirty days
in jail.

With some support from women's groups, Sanger started a new
magazine, the Birth Control Review. In Nineteen-Twenty-One, she
organized the first American birth control conference. The
conference led to the creation of the American Birth Control League.
It was established to provide education, legal reform and research
for better birth control. The group opened a birth control center in
the United States in Nineteen-Twenty-Three. Many centers that opened
later across the country copied this one.

Sanger was president of the American Birth Control League until
Nineteen-Twenty-Eight. In the Nineteen-Thirties she helped win a
judicial decision that permitted American doctors to give out
information about birth control.

(MUSIC)

VOICE TWO:

Historians say Margaret Sanger changed her methods of political
action during and after the Nineteen-Twenties. She stopped using
direct opposition and illegal acts. She even sought support from her
former opponents.

Later, Sanger joined supporters of eugenics. This is the study of
human improvement by genetic control. Extremists among that group
believe that disabled, weak or "undesirable" human beings should not
be born. Historians say Sanger supported eugenicists only as a way
to gain her birth control goals. She later said she was wrong in
supporting eugenics. But she still is criticized for these
statements.

VOICE ONE:

Even though Margaret Sanger changed her methods, she continued
her efforts for birth control. In the Nineteen-Forty-Two, she helped
form the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. It became a major
national health organization after World War Two.

Margaret Sanger moved into areas of international activism. Her
efforts led to the creation of the International Planned Parenthood
Federation. It was formed in Nineteen-Fifty-Two after an
international conference in Bombay, India. Sanger was one of its
first presidents.

The organization was aimed at increasing the acceptance of family
planning around the world. Almost every country in the world is now
a member of the international group.

VOICE TWO:

Margaret Sanger lived to see the end of the Comstock Act and the
invention of birth control medicine. She died in Nineteen-Sixty-Six
in Tucson, Arizona. She was an important part of what has been
called one of the most life-changing political movements of the
Twentieth Century.

(THEME)

VOICE ONE:

This Special English program was written by Doreen Baingana and
produced by Caty Weaver. I'm Shirley Griffith.

VOICE TWO:

And I'm Sarah Long. Join us again next week for another PEOPLE IN
AMERICA program on the Voice of America.