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166-End Discussion Points
1. Law prohibits dissemination of birth control literature.
2. Anthony Comstock resented women who limited the size of their families.
3. 105 people arrested for birth control offenses4. Madame Restell’s suicide5. Comstock Laws6. The idea of women wanting to indulge in
intercourse while avoiding pregnancy was strange. Women are too pure to enjoy sex.
Brief History of Abortion in America
1. Quickening-Time when a woman first feels the stirring of the fetus.
1800-1820
8 kids in average family
Main motivation for abortion was illegitimacy
Mostly for married women known to have a history of severe pain during past pregnancies
1800-1820 The Golden Age for the Fight Against Abortion
Madame Restell, Comstock, Sanger to name a few
NY Times reports in major cities-Was abortion an urban phenomenon?
Kids viewed as a burden as abortion or inquiries increase
Quickening definition Changed: A separate entity is alive prior to the stirring of the fetus
Comparison and Reasons
Not Getting Abortions
ImmigrantsCatholics
Lower Class (but they wanted abortions)Older generation not into partying
Rural 1:5People viewed with perceived status (religious leaders, politicians doctors)
Getting Abortions
AmericansProtestantsUpper Class
Young wanting to partyUrban 1:2
State Laws and Interpretation During the 1900s
1/3 of states distinguish between quickened and un-quickenedBy the end of 1800s states
Protection of maternal health
Madame Restell or Ann Lohman 1812-1878
$20 for poor women$100 for her increasingly wealthy clienteleDelivered babiesPlaced infants for adoptionConducted sex education classes.
Comstock entrapped Lohman by posing as a husband seeking abortion services for a lady. When she provided him with some tablets, he returned and arrested her — accompanied by two reporters. She faced years in jail.
Lohman climbed into her marble bathtub on the April morning her trial was to start, and slit her own throat. She was 66.
Anthony ComstockReligion: Christianity
Targets prostitution and pornography by tipping off police
Anti-obscenity crusade
1872 Anti-Obscenity Bill
Federal offense to disseminate birth control through the mail and/or across state lines
Ida Craddock 1857-1902
Sexual counselor for married couples and developer of sex manuals
A writer on the topic of human sexuality included, Heavenly Bridegrooms, Psychic Wedlock, Spiritual Joys, Letter To A Prospective Bride, The Wedding Night and Right Marital Living
Anthony Comstock declares books too obscene and arrests Ida
Committed suicide slashing her wrists and inhaling natural gas from the oven in her apartment, on October 16, 1902, the day before reporting to Federal prison for a five year sentence.
From The Wedding Night
Also, to the bride, I would say : Bear in mind that it is part of your wifely duty to perform
pelvic movements during the embrace, riding your husband's
organ gently, and, at times, passionately, with various movements, up and down, sideways, and with a semi-
rotary movement, resembling the movement of the thread of
a screw upon a screw.
Emma Goldman
Russian immigrant
Late 1800 anarchist
Coins term “birth control”
Arrested for violating Comstock Law and spends two weeks in a work house
Margaret Sanger
American Birth Control League 1921
“We hold that children should be (1) Conceived in love; (2) Born of the mother's conscious desire; (3) And only begotten under conditions which render possible the heritage of health. Therefore we hold that every woman must possess the power and freedom to prevent conception except when these conditions can be satisfied.”
More about Sanger
Writes Morality of Birth Control
Travels to other countries to obtain items banned in the USA
Goal: Overturn contraception restrictions. Orders diaphragm from Japan that was confiscated by the US government.
Ruling: Physicians could obtain diaphragms
Planned Parenthood organizer 1946-To have a simple, cheap, harmless contraceptive for the World’s poor
What Else did She Do
Cervical Cap in Europe she Wants available in the USBut cannot due to Comstock Laws.
Loophole-Make the item in the US in two separate parts to avoid breaking laws.
What about this?
Grafenberg Ring 1928
Just Insert a foreign device into your uterus to causean inflammatory response, which creates ahostile environment for sperm. The silver wire used to construct later versions of Gräfenberg'sring was contaminated with copper, which increases this spermicidal effect.
Questions RaisedWhat are the limits of a woman’s right to make her own reproductive decisions? Should the unborn be afforded legal rights? What rights does the father have? In 1976 the Supreme Court held that a state could not require a married woman
to get her husband’s consent before having an abortion. Is the husband’s claim of a role in an abortion decision a reinstatement of the old law of coverture (the idea that a woman had no legal existence separate from her husband)?
What rights does the community have to set general policy? What are the appropriate limits of government intervention? The state may not require a woman to conceive a child: can the state require a
woman to a bear a child? Will any of these rights changes as improvements are made in the technology for
the discovery of birth defects and genetic abnormalities, for the implantation of the embryos, and for caring for premature infants at earlier ages?
Planned Parenthood• If you are under 18, your state may require one or both of your parents to give
permission for your abortion or be told of your decision prior to the abortion. In most states with these requirements:
• You can ask a judge to excuse you from getting permission or telling your parent or guardian. (This is called a "judicial bypass.")
• A legal guardian can give permission or be notified in place of a parent. • If you meet legal rules showing that you are independent of the care and control of
your parents or a guardian, you do not need to get their permission or notify them. • In some states, you can be excused from involving a parent without going to a
judge if you are the victim of abuse or neglect and you or your doctor report this to the appropriate authorities.
CaliforniaNo parental involvement requirement.
New JerseyNo parental involvement requirement
Melissa Drexler
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTJbD0wTpI4
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