Margaret Sanger

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Margaret Sanger (Template:Née Higgins; September 14, 1879Template:SndsSeptember 6, 1966) was an American birth control activist, sex educator, writer, and nurse. She opened the first birth control clinic in the United States, founded Planned Parenthood, and was instrumental in the development of the first birth control pill. Sanger is regarded as a founder and leader of the birth control movement.

In the early 1900s, contraceptives, abortion, and even birth control literature were illegal in much of the U.S. Working as a nurse in the slums of New York City, Sanger often treated mothers desperate to avoid conceiving additional children, many of whom had resorted to back-alley abortions. Sanger was a first-wave feminist and believed that women should be able to decide if and when to have children, leading her to campaign for the legalization of contraceptives. As an adherent of the eugenics movement, she argued that birth control would reduce the number of unfit people and improve the overall health of the human race. She was also influenced by Malthusian concerns about the detrimental effects of overpopulation.

To promote birth control, Sanger gave speeches, wrote books, and published periodicals. Sanger deliberately flouted laws that prohibited distribution of information about contraceptives, and was arrested eight times. Her activism led to court rulings that legalized birth control, including one that enabled physicians to dispense contraceptives; and anotherTemplate:Snd Griswold v. ConnecticutTemplate:Snd which legalized contraception, without a prescription, for couples nationwide.

Sanger established a network of dozens of birth control clinics across the country, which provided reproductive health services to hundreds of thousands of patients. She discouraged abortion, and her clinics never offered abortion services during her lifetime. She founded several organizations dedicated to family planning, including Planned Parenthood and International Planned Parenthood Federation. In the early 1950s, Sanger persuaded philanthropists to provide funding for biologist Gregory Pincus to develop the first birth control pill. She died in Arizona in 1966.

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Early lifeEdit

Sanger's parents were Irish Catholics who separately emigrated from Ireland. Her father, Michael Hennessey Higgins, immigrated to Canada with his family, then moved to the U.S. at the age of 14, and joined the Union army in the Civil War as a drummer at 15. Upon leaving the army, he studied medicine and phrenology but ultimately became a stonecutter.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Her mother, Anne Purcell Higgins, immigrated to the U.S. with her family during the Great Famine.Template:Sfn Anne and Michael were married in 1869.Template:Sfn

Sanger was born Margaret Louise Higgins September 14, 1879 in Corning, New York. She spent her early years in a bustling household, under the influence of her father, who was a free-thinker, a socialist, and an agnostic.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn In 22 years, Anne Higgins conceived 18 times, and gave birth to 11 live babies. She died at the age of 50, when Margaret was 19 years old.Template:Sfn Template:Efn

With financial help from two elder sisters, Margaret Higgins attended the Hudson River Institute at Claverack College from 1896 to 1900, then nursing school at White Plains Hospital from 1900 to 1902.Template:Sfn After graduating as a nurse, she married architect William Sanger in 1902. Although she suffered from tuberculosis, she settled down to a quiet life in Hastings-on-Hudson and had three children.Template:Sfn

Beginning of Activism and The Woman RebelEdit

File:The Woman Rebel issue1.jpg

First issue of The Woman Rebel newsletter, March 1914. Seven issues were published.Template:Sfn

In 1911, after a fire destroyed their home, the Sangers abandoned the suburbs for a new life in New York City. Margaret Sanger worked as a nurse, making house calls in the slums of the East Side, while her husband worked as an architect and artist. The couple socialized with the bohemian community of Greenwich Village, including local intellectuals, left-wing artists, socialists, and social activists, such as John Reed, Upton Sinclair, Mabel Dodge, and Emma Goldman. Sanger and her husband embraced socialism; Margaret joined the Women's Committee of the Socialist Party of New York and took part in the labor actions of the Industrial Workers of the World, including the 1912 Lawrence textile strike and the 1913 Paterson silk strike.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Working as a nurse, Sanger visited many working-class immigrant women in their homes; many of them underwent frequent childbirth, miscarriages, and self-induced abortions.Template:Sfn Availability of contraceptive information was limited, due to the Comstock Act, a federal anti-obscenity law which prohibitedTemplate:Sndamong other thingsTemplate:Sndmailing contraceptives, or even information about contraception.Template:Sfn In 1913, Sanger visited public libraries, searching for publications that instructed women how to avoid conception, but she found none.<ref>Template:Harvnb Kennedy points out that some materials on birth control were available in New York libraries in 1913. Sanger's description of the search: Template:Harvnb.</ref>

The hardships women faced were epitomized in a story that Sanger often recounted in her speeches: while working as a nurse, she was called to the apartment of a woman, "Sadie Sachs", who had a severe sepsis infection due to a self-induced abortion. Sadie begged the attending doctor to tell her how she could prevent this from happening again. The doctor laughed and said "You want your cake while you eat it too, do you? Well it can't be done. I'll tell you the only sure thing to do .... Tell Jake to sleep on the roof Template:Bracket." A few months later, Sanger was called back to Sadie's apartment and found that Sadie had attempted yet another self-induced abortion; she died shortly after Sanger arrived. Sanger would sometimes end the story by saying, "I threw my nursing bag in the corner and announced ... that I would never take another case until I had made it possible for working women in America to have the knowledge to control birth."Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Harvnb. Chesler concluded that Sachs may have been "an imaginative, dramatic composite" of several women; Engelman shares that view: Template:Harvnb. Additional insight into the Sadie Sachs story can be found in:
• Template:Harvnb.
• Template:Harvnb. Several patients with sepsis.
• Template:Harvnb. A version of the story with the "threw my nursing bag" line. </ref>

The Sadie Sachs episode was described by Sanger as the origin of her commitment to spare women from dangerous and illegal abortions.Template:Sfn Sanger opposed abortion, not on religious grounds, but as a societal ill and public health danger, which would disappear, she believed, if women were able to prevent unwanted pregnancy.Template:Sfn

Searching for a way to share her ideas with the public, she wrote two columns for the New York Call socialist magazine: What Every Mother Should Know (1911–12) and What Every Girl Should Know (1912–13).Template:Sfn The columns gave advice to women and girls on love, masturbation, and sex; and emphasized the distinction between sex and love.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn By the standards of the day, Sanger's articles were extremely frank in their discussion of sexuality, and many New York Call readers were outraged by them. Other readers, however, praised the series for its integrity and candor.Template:Sfn Both series were later published in book form.Template:Sfn

Sanger's political interests, her emerging feminism, and her nursing experience led her to believe that only by liberating women from the risk of unwanted pregnancy would fundamental social change take place. In 1914, she undertook a decades-long campaign to free women, starting with The Woman Rebel, an eight-page monthly newsletter that used the slogan "No Gods, No Masters."<ref name="ngnm">Template:Harvnb</ref>Template:Efn The newsletter contained articles about a variety of progressive subjects, including contraception, and was designed to challenge governmental censorship of contraceptive information through confrontation.Template:Sfn Seven issues of The Woman Rebel were published, from March to September, 1914.Template:Sfn The Woman Rebel helped popularize the term "birth control", which was selected by Sanger and fellow activists as a more candid alternative to euphemisms then in use, such as "family limitation".Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn

Sanger became estranged from her husband in 1913, and their divorce was finalized in 1921.Template:Sfn

Year as an outlawEdit

File:1917 Edition of Family Limitations.jpg

This page from Sanger's Family Limitation, 1919 Ninth edition, describes a cervical cap.<ref>Template:Cite book The first edition of Family Limitation had no illustrations; they were gradually added in subsequent editions.</ref>

Sanger's first obstacle to educating women about contraception was the Comstock Act, which banned dissemination of information about contraception. Her strategy was to deliberately violate the Act, hoping that the confrontation would eventually lead to amendment of the law.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Throughout 1914, she attempted to mail copies of the monthly The Woman Rebel newsletter. This was meant to be provocative, rather than effective, as most copies of The Woman Rebel were distributed by a network of activists, not mailed.Template:Sfn Postal authorities intercepted five of its seven issues, but Sanger continued publication.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn In August that year, Sanger was finally arrested for sending The Woman Rebel through the postal system.Template:Sfn

While awaiting trial, she wrote a 16-page pamphlet, Family Limitation, which detailed several contraceptive methods, discussed marriage and sex, and chided husbands whoTemplate:Sndafter sexTemplate:Snd fell asleep without bringing their wife to a climax.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Fearing arrest, several printers refused to print the pamphlet; she finally found a socialist printer willing to undertake the job, and he resorted to printing it secretly, at night.Template:Sfn The pamphlet was very popular: 100,000 copies were printed of its first edition, it went through 18 editions, and it was translated into a dozen languages.Template:Sfn

Facing imprisonment if she went to trial, she fled to Canada, where fellow activists forged a passport that permitted her to sail to England in early November.Template:Sfn Template:Efn Sanger spent most of her self-imposed exile in England, where contact with British MalthusiansTemplate:Sndsuch as Charles Vickery Drysdale and Bessie Drysdale Template:Snd helped refine her socioeconomic justifications for birth control. She shared the concern of Malthusians that overpopulation led to poverty, famine, and war.Template:Sfn She returned to Europe in 1922 to attend the Fifth International Neo-Malthusian ConferenceTemplate:Sndwhere she became the first woman to chair a session;Template:Sfn and she organized the Sixth International Neo-Malthusian and Birth-Control Conference that took place in New York in 1925.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Overpopulation would remain a concern of hers for the rest of her life.Template:Sfn

During her stay in England, she was profoundly influenced by British physician Havelock Ellis Template:Sndauthor of the multi-volume Studies in the Psychology of Sex.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Under his tutelage, she expanded her birth control strategy to incorporate the additional benefit of stress-free, enjoyable sex; and came to adopt his view of sexuality as a powerful, liberating force.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn While abroad, Sanger met with several Spanish anarchists, including activist Lorenzo Portet, with whom she had a passionate affair.Template:Sfn Template:Efn

News reports from America signaled to Sanger that support for birth control was increasing, so she returned from England in October 1915 to face trial. Shortly before the December trial, her five-year-old daughter, Peggy, died of pneumonia she caught while at a boarding school.Template:Sfn Template:Efn Sanger was offered a plea bargain, but refused, because she wanted to use the trial as a forum to advocate for the right of women to control their own bodies.Template:Sfn The prosecutor dropped the charges because he did not want to turn Sanger into a martyr.Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Harvnb. For a detailed legal discussion of the case, see {{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Early in 1915, an undercover representative of anti-vice politician Anthony Comstock asked Sanger's estranged husband, William, for a copy of Family Limitation, and William obliged. William was tried and convicted, spending thirty days in jail while attracting interest in birth control as an issue of civil liberty.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn<ref>Additional insight into the anti-obscenity laws can be found in:
• Template:Cite book
• Template:Cite news</ref>

The start of a movementEdit

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File:SangerOnCourtSteps2.jpg

Sanger with her sister, Ethel Byrne, on the steps of a New York courthouse during a trial in 1917.Template:Sfn

Some European countries had more liberal policies towards contraception than the United States. When Sanger visited a Dutch birth control clinic in 1915, she encountered diaphragms and became convinced that they were a more effective means of contraception than the suppositories and douches that she had been distributing back in the United States.Template:Sfn Diaphragms were generally unavailable in the United States due to the Comstock Act, so Sanger and others began importing them from Europe, in defiance of United States law.Template:Sfn

On October 16, 1916, Sanger opened a family planning and birth control clinicTemplate:Sndthe first in the United StatesTemplate:Sndin the Brownsville neighborhood of the Brooklyn borough of New York City.Template:Sfn Template:Efn She was unable to find a physician to join the staff, so she turned to her sister, Ethel Byrne (a nurse), to fill the medical role.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn Nine days after the clinic opened, Sanger was arrested for giving a birth control pamphlet to an undercover policewoman.Template:Sfn After she bailed out of jail, she continued assisting women in the clinic until the police arrested her a second time.Template:Sfn<ref name="brownsville"/> The clinic closed permanently after one month of operation, when the police forced the landlord to evict Sanger.<ref name="brownsville">Katz – Brownsville Clinic.</ref>

Sanger and her sister were charged with distributing contraceptives in violation of New York state law. They went to trial on 29 January 1917.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Byrne was convicted and sentenced to 30 days in a workhouse, where she went on a hunger strike. She was force-fed, the first woman hunger striker in the U.S. to be so treated.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> After ten daysTemplate:Sndwhen Sanger pledged that Byrne would never break the lawTemplate:Sndher sister was pardoned.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Sanger was also convicted; the trial judge was not persuaded by Sanger's argument that women had the right to enjoy sex without worrying about conceiving an unwanted child.<ref>Template:Harvnb. Original court decision at Template:Cite journal The judge wrote that women do not have "the right to copulate with a feeling of security that there will be no resulting conception."</ref> Sanger was offered a more lenient sentence if she promised not to break the law again, but she refused and said: "I cannot respect the law as it exists today."Template:Sfn<ref name="TBCT">Template:Harvnb.</ref> Against the wishes of her attorney, she chose a thirty-day sentence in a workhouse, rather than a $5,000 fine.<ref name="TBCT"/>Template:Sfn

An initial appeal was rejected, but in a subsequent court proceeding in 1918 (after Sanger had served her sentence) the birth control movement secured a major victory when the New York Court of Appeals (New York's highest court) issued a ruling which allowed physicians in New York to dispense contraceptives.<ref>Template:Harvnb.</ref><ref name="vullo">Template:Cite journal</ref>Template:Efn The publicity surrounding Sanger's arrest, trial, and appeal sparked birth control activism across the United States, and generated momentum for the birth control movement.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn

In February 1917, Sanger began publishing the periodical Birth Control Review, serving as its editor until 1929. The magazine was published monthly until 1940.<ref name="bcr2">Katz – Birth Control Review History.</ref>

In her 1920 book Woman and the New Race, Sanger framed her fight for birth control in the context of history, psychology, and feminism.<ref>Template:Harvnb. Chesler writes that the word "race" in the title of the book means "not ... distinctions of color but ... in the generic sense, as 'in the human race'".</ref>Template:Sfn Template:Sfn She wrote that male-dominated institutions, such as the church and state, have prohibited birth control throughout historyTemplate:Sndleading women to have too many children, too closely spaced. This, in turn, was a direct cause of mental distress and social pathology, and prevented women from full expression of their "feminine spirit". Sanger asserted that women have always fought back against this oppression through secretive use of abortion, contraception, or infanticide.<ref name="FemSp">Template:Harvnb. In the book, Sanger created the concept of a "feminine spirit": an essence that was common to all women.</ref> She believed that these efforts to limit family size were a manifestation of women's desire for freedom, writing:

"A free race cannot be born of slave mothers. A woman cannot choose but give a measure of that bondage to her sons and daughters. No woman can call herself free who does not own and control her body. No woman can call herself free until she can choose consciously whether she will or will not be a mother."<ref name="FemSp"/>Template:Sfn{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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Sanger had a long-term, though infrequent, love affair with the novelist H. G. Wells from 1920 until his death in 1946.Template:Sfn In 1922, she married her second husband, businessman James Noah H. Slee.<ref>Template:Harvnb. Slee was president of 3-in-One Oil company.</ref>

OrganizingEdit

File:Kitty Marion in USA selling BC Review in 1925.jpg

Activist Kitty Marion sold copies of Birth Control Review on the streets of New York for 13 years.<ref>Template:Cite journal In this photo Marion is selling Template:Cite journal</ref>

After World War I, Sanger continued to be frustrated by the inverted priorities of charities: they provided free obstetric and post-birth care to indigent women, yet failed to offer birth control or assistance in raising the children. She wrote: "The poor woman is taught how to have her seventh child, when what she wants to know is how to avoid ... her eighth."<ref name="levy">Template:Cite book Levy quotes Sanger from: Template:Harvnb.</ref> Sanger saw a societal need to limit births by those least able to afford children: the affluent and educated already limited their childbearing, yet the poor and uneducated lacked access to contraception and information about birth control.Template:Sfn

Support from wealthy donors in the early 1920s enabled Sanger to expand her reach beyond local, small-scale activism, and allowed her to organize the American Birth Control League (ABCL).<ref name="brownsville"/>Template:Sfn The founding principles of the ABCL were:

"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."<ref>These principles were adopted at the first meeting of the ABCL in late 1921, and were published in
Template:Cite book Also in Template:Cite journal </ref>{{#if:|{{#if:|}}

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The 1918 New York court decision had created an exception to the Comstock Act: contraceptives could be obtained, provided they were prescribed by a physician. To exploit this new loophole, in 1923 she established the Clinical Research Bureau (CRB)Template:Snda medical clinic with physicians on staff.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn The CRB was the first birth control clinic in the U.S. that could dispense contraceptives directly to patients; and its staff of doctors, nurses, and social workers was entirely female.<ref>Template:Harvnb. See also Template:Harvnb.</ref>Template:Efn The clinic received extensive funding from John D. Rockefeller Jr. and his family, who continued to make anonymous donations to Sanger's causes in subsequent decades.<ref name="Rockefeller">Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Sfn

In 1922, soon after the formation of the ABCL, Sanger raised her international profile by traveling to AsiaTemplate:Sndgiving speeches in Korea, Japan, and China.Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> She ultimately visited Japan seven times, working with feminist Shidzue Katō to promote birth control in Japan.Template:Sfn<ref name="facing">Template:Cite book</ref>

As president of the ABCL, she chafed at bureaucratic interference from younger members of the board of directors.Template:Sfn Seeking more independence, she resigned from the presidency in 1928 and took full control of the CRB, renaming it the Birth Control Clinical Research Bureau (BCCRB). The two organizations, ABCL and BCCRB, continued to collaborate, but Sanger had complete control over the BCCRB's operations. This marked the beginning of a schism that would last until 1939.Template:Sfn<ref name="BCH"/> By the 1930s, the BCCRB was serving over 10,000 patients per year, providing a range of gynecological services, conducting research, and training physicians and students.<ref name="BCH">Katz – Birth Control Clinical Research Bureau History.</ref>

In 1925, Sanger's second husband, Noah Slee, contributed to the birth control movement by smuggling diaphragms into New York from Canada, hidden inside his company's cargo.Template:Sfn He then co-founded Holland-Rantos Template:Sndthe first manufacturer of legal diaphragms in the United States.Template:Sfn

Outreach and expansionEdit

File:Birth Control Review 1919.jpg

Sanger's monthly Birth Control Review included letters from women, typically in need of birth control, which were collected into the book Motherhood in Bondage.Template:Sfn Template:Efn

Sanger invested a great deal of effort in promoting birth control to the public. In 1916, she embarked on a cross-country lecture tour, speaking in dozens of citiesTemplate:Snd at churches, women's clubs, homes, and theaters. Her audience included workers, churchmen, liberals, socialists, scientists, and upper-class women.Template:Sfn She once lectured on birth control to the women's auxiliary of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) in Silver Lake, New Jersey.<ref name="lectures">Template:Harvnb. Sanger's description of KKK: Template:Harvnb.</ref> Explaining her decision to address them, Sanger said that she was willing to speak to any group that would listen, if it helped promote the birth control cause. She described the experience as weird, and reported that she had the impression that the audience were dull, and so she spoke to them in the simplest possible language, as if talking to children.<ref name="lectures"/>Template:Efn

She wrote several books that had a nationwide impact in promoting the cause of birth control. Between 1920 and 1926, she sold 567,000 copies of Woman and the New Race and her 1922 book The Pivot of Civilization.Template:Sfn She wrote two autobiographies, both aimed at promoting birth control: Margaret Sanger: My Fight for Birth Control published in 1931; and Margaret Sanger An Autobiography published in 1938.Template:Sfn

During the 1920s, Sanger received hundreds of thousands of letters, many of them written in desperation by women begging for information on how to prevent unwanted pregnancies.Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Cite journal Number of letters.</ref> Many of the letters were printed in the monthly Birth Control Review, and 470 of these letters were compiled into the 1928 book, Motherhood in Bondage.Template:Sfn

Throughout the 1920s, Sanger and the ABCL expanded outward from their New York base by creating a network of birth control clinics across the country: Chicago (1924), Los Angeles (1925), San Antonio (1926), Detroit and Baltimore (1927), Cleveland, Newark, and Denver (1928), and Atlanta, Cincinnati, and Oakland (1929). These clinics were managed by local birth control advocates, and funded by local donors. Those that met Sanger's standards became official affiliates of the BCCRB.<ref name="expans">Template:Cite journal</ref> A survey in 1930 showed that twelve of the clinics were, collectively, seeing a total of about 8,000 new patients per year.<ref>Template:Cite book The 1972 edition is a reprint of the original 1930 edition.</ref>

African American communityEdit

File:WEB DuBois 1918.jpg

W. E. B. Du Bois served on the board of Sanger's Harlem clinic.Template:Sfn

Women of all races and religions were served by Sanger's birth control clinics. Sanger did not tolerate bigotry among her staff, nor would she tolerate any refusal to work within interracial projects.<ref>Template:Harvnb, Bigotry: p. 153. See also Template:Harvnb.</ref> By 1929 about 12% of clinic patients listed Harlem as their address.Template:Sfn

In 1924, James H. Hubert, an African American social worker and the leader of New York's Urban League, asked Sanger to consider opening a clinic in an African American neighborhood.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn In response, she established a clinic in the Columbus Hill neighborhood of New York City, but the clinic operated for only three months before closing due to low patient numbers.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn

In 1929, Hubert approached Sanger again, this time suggesting a clinic in Harlem.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Sanger secured funding from the Julius Rosenwald Fund and opened the clinic in 1930.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn The clinic was supported by an all-African American advisory board of 15 members and exclusively employed African American staff, including doctors, nurses, and social workers.Template:Sfn<ref name="bbbp">Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Efn The clinic was publicized in the African American press as well as in African American churches, and it received the approval of W. E. B. Du Bois, the co-founder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the editor of its magazine, The Crisis.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn The clinic's clientele was about half African American and half white, and almost 3,000 patients visited the clinic in its first year and a half.Template:Sfn The Harlem clinic provided contraceptives and information to thousands of African American women until it closed in the mid-1940s.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn

In June 1932, Sanger published a special issue of Birth Control Review titled "The Negro Number". Seven African American authorsTemplate:Sndincluding W.E.B Du Bois, George Schuyler, and Charles S. Johnson Template:Sndcontributed articles to the issue, providing reasons why contraception was beneficial for the African American community.Template:Sfn Template:Efn

During the 1920s and 1930s, Sanger toured the South and observed that African American women were neglected by the medical establishment, particularly in segregated areas.Template:Sfn In 1939, she worked with fellow birth control advocates Mary Lasker and Clarence Gamble to create the Negro Project, an effort to deliver information about birth control to impoverished African American people.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Sanger knew that the church played an important role in African American communities, so she advised Gamble (both Sanger and Gamble were white) on the importance of affiliating with African American ministers, writing:

"The ministers work is also important and also he should be trained, perhaps by the [Birth Control] Federation [of America] as to our ideals and the goal that we hope to reach. We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members."<ref name="Sanger 1939-12-10">Template:Harvnb.</ref>{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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When academic and activist Angela Davis, author of Women, Race and Class, analyzed that quote, she concluded that by 1939 the birth control movement had lost its progressive potential, and had evolved into a racist program of population control.Template:Sfn Template:Efn Template:Efn Davis' interpretation has been amplified by anti-abortion activists, leading many people to believe that Sanger was racist.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn However, most scholars interpret the passage as Sanger's effort to prevent the spread of unfounded rumors about nefarious purposes, and they find no evidence that Sanger was a racist.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn Template:Efn

After the Negro Project was initiated, management was handed to the Birth Control Federation of America. The project lasted from 1940 to 1943, but was unsuccessful: no new clinics were established, and participation rates remained low.Template:Sfn

Planned ParenthoodEdit

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File:17-23 West 16th St.jpg

Sanger opened a clinic in this building in 1930, and it operated in New York City for 43 years. It is now a National Historic Landmark.Template:Sfn

In 1929, Sanger formed the National Committee on Federal Legislation for Birth Control to lobby for legislation to overturn restrictions on contraception.<ref name=ncf>Katz – National Committee on Federal Legislation on Birth Control.</ref>Template:Efn The lobbying did not produce results, so Sanger changed tack and in 1933 she ordered diaphragms from Japan to trigger a decisive battle in the courts.<ref name=ncf/>Template:Sfn The diaphragms were seized by the U.S. government, and Sanger's subsequent legal challenge to the confiscation led to a breakthrough 1936 court decisionTemplate:SndUnited States v. One Package of Japanese PessariesTemplate:Snd which permitted physicians to dispense contraceptives nationwide.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn This court victory motivated the American Medical Association to adopt contraception as a normal medical service (1937) and a key component of medical school curriculums (1942).Template:Sfn Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

Eager to take advantage of the One Package of Japanese Pessaries court ruling, which permitted birth control clinics across the country to begin dispensing contraceptives, leaders of the birth control movement took steps in 1937 to mend the rift between the ABCL and the BCCRB.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The two organizations merged in 1939 as the Birth Control Federation of America and, simultaneously, Sanger stepped down from her role as President/Chairman.<ref name="BCH"/>Template:Sfn Template:Efn She no longer wielded the same power as she had in the early years of the movement, and in 1942 more conservative forces within the organization changed the name to Planned Parenthood Federation of America, a name Sanger objected to because she considered it too euphemistic.Template:Sfn

In the late 1940s, Sanger reduced her involvement in Planned Parenthood, and turned her attention to improving access to birth control globally. In 1948 she founded an exploratory committee, the International Committee on Planned Parenthood, which brought together representatives from birth control organizations in several countries around the world.<ref name="IPPF" /> Four years later, in 1952, the committee evolved into the International Planned Parenthood Federation, whichTemplate:Snd Template:As of Template:Sndis the world's largest family planning NGO, consisting of 150 member associations working in 146 countries.<ref name="IPPF">Katz – International Planned Parenthood Federation History.</ref><ref> {{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>Template:Sfn Sanger was the organization's first president and served in that role from 1952 to 1959.<ref name="IPPF"/>

In the early 1950s, Sanger persuaded philanthropist Katharine McCormick to provide funding for biologist Gregory Pincus to develop the first birth control pill, which was eventually sold under the name Enovid.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Pincus recruited John Rock, a gynecologist at Harvard, to investigate clinical use of progesterone to prevent ovulation.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Pincus would later say that Sanger's role was essential in the development of the pill.Template:Sfn

In 1954, Sanger returned to Japan for her fourth visit, and gave a speech before a committee of the National Diet on the topic of "Population Problems and Family Planning".Template:Sfn<ref name="facing"/><ref name="ms of japan">Template:Cite journal "... she was invited to speak to a Diet committee, the first foreigner to do so."</ref>Template:Efn

Later life and deathEdit

File:Margaret Sanger's Gravestone in Fishkill.jpg

Sanger's gravestone (lower right) in Fishkill Rural Cemetery. "Slee" is the family name of her second husband.

In the late 1930s, Sanger began spending the winters in Tucson, Arizona, intending to play a less critical role in the birth control movement. She moved to Arizona full-time in 1943, after her husband died. In spite of her intention to retire, she remained active in the birth control movement through the 1950s.Template:Sfn

Sanger was silent about her personal religious beliefs through much of her life. At the time of her second marriage in 1922, Sanger was a socialist, bohemian atheistTemplate:Sndaccording to biographer Ellen Chesler.Template:Sfn Template:Efn When Sanger was 78 years old, she stated she was Episcopalian.<ref>Template:Harvnb. In 1957, in response to a question about her religion, Sanger replied: "...I feel that we have divinity with within us, and the more we express the good part of our lives, the more the divine within us expresses itself. I suppose I would call myself Episcopalian, by religion. And there's uh many other, if you travel around the world, you get quite a bit of the feeling of all religions have so much alike in the divine part of our own being..."</ref>Template:Efn

Faced with declining health, Sanger moved into a convalescent home at age 83.Template:Sfn Before her death, the U.S. Supreme Court decided Griswold v. Connecticut, which struck down state laws prohibiting birth control in the United States.Template:Sfn The defendant in that case, Estelle Griswold, was the director of the Connecticut affiliate of Planned Parenthood.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> A year before Sanger died, the Japanese government bestowed upon her the Order of the Precious Crown in recognition of her contributions to Japanese society.Template:Sfn She died of arteriosclerosis on September 6, 1966 in Tucson, Arizona, aged 86. Her funeral was held at St. Philip's in the Hills Episcopal Church in Tucson, followed a month later by a memorial service at St. George's Episcopal Church in Manhattan.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Sanger is buried in Fishkill, New York, next to her sister, Nan Higgins, and her second husband, Noah Slee.Template:Sfn

ViewsEdit

AbortionEdit

File:Sanger Flyer.jpg

1916 flyer for Sanger's first clinic, stating "Do not kill, do not take life, but prevent."<ref name="PreventFlyer"/>

In the early 1900s, when Sanger started as an activist, abortion was illegal throughout the United StatesTemplate:Sndthough medically necessary abortions were permitted in some states.<ref name="abIllegal">Template:Cite report</ref> Although abortion was illegal, it was widespread: in 1930, there were an estimated 800,000 illegal abortions performed in the U.S., resulting in 8,000 to 17,000 women's deaths from complications.<ref>Template:Cite book Garrow obtained his estimates from data collected by Alan Frank Guttmacher and Frederick J. Taussig. </ref>Template:Efn Abortion frequency ranged from an estimated one abortion per five live births, to one abortion per 2.5 live births.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Despite the high rates of morbidity and death from back-alley abortions, there was no prospect of legalizing abortion in Sanger's era; serious efforts to legalize abortion did not begin in the U.S. until the mid-1950s.<ref name=AbCrime>Template:Cite book Efforts to legalize abortion began earlier, in the 1930s, in Europe.</ref>

Sanger focused all her efforts on promoting contraception, rather than campaigning to make abortion legal. In her view, contraception was beneficial for many reasons: it was safe, simple, inexpensive, reduced the number of unwanted pregnancies, addressed overpopulation, andTemplate:Sndmost importantlyTemplate:Sndit eliminated the need for dangerous abortions.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Historian Peter Engelman notes an irony in Sanger's desire to end abortions: "... the birth control movement of the early 20th century, which evolved into a reproductive rights movement that vowed to make and keep abortion legal, set out initially to end the practice of abortion, which was then illegal."Template:Sfn

The majority of the educational material that Sanger produced was focused on contraception, and abortion was rarely mentioned. In her Family Limitation pamphlet, published in 1914, she wrote that every woman is entitled to make a choice of whether to have an abortion or not, and she suggested (incorrectly) that quinine could be used to induce abortion.<ref name="EngAb">Template:Harvnb.</ref>Template:Efn That pamphlet was the only time she mentioned a technique for abortion.<ref name="EngAb"/>Template:Efn

Sanger made many public statements discouraging abortion.Template:Efn When she opened her first birth control clinic in 1916, she distributed flyers to women, exhortingTemplate:Sndin all capitalsTemplate:Snd"Do not kill, do not take life, but prevent."<ref name="PreventFlyer">Template:Harvnb. Flyer is reprinted in Template:Harvnb.</ref> After Pope Pius XI published Of Chaste Wedlock, an encyclical on sex, Sanger wrote a critical reply in 1932, which included:

"[Abortion] is an alternative that I cannot too strongly condemn. Although abortion may be resorted to in order to save the life of the mother, the practice of it merely for limitation of offspring is dangerous and vicious."Template:Sfn{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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Abortions were not performed at clinics managed by Sanger. For many years, staff were not even permitted to refer patients to physicians (in other facilities) for medically necessary abortions.Template:Sfn In 1932, sixteen years after the first clinic opened, Sanger authorized staff to refer patients to hospitals for medically necessary abortions.Template:Sfn Template:Efn Planned Parenthood clinics would not offer abortions until 1970, several years after Sanger's death.<ref> {{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Despite Sanger's public statements denouncing abortion for the purpose of limiting family size, historian Jean Baker suggests that Sanger privately felt that the procedure was ethicalTemplate:Sndbut only as a last resort.Template:Sfn

Free speechEdit

File:Sanger Gagged H.png

Boston prohibited Sanger from speaking, so she wore a gag, and A. M. Schlesinger Sr. read her statement of protest, April 16, 1929.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Advocates for birth control employed a variety of tactics. Some, such as Mary Dennett, preferred to work peacefully within the legislative system, and tried to amend the Comstock Act through lobbying. But Sanger chose to treat the undertaking as a battle for free speech, and repeatedly broke anti-obscenity laws, hoping to provoke arrest, whichTemplate:Sndshe hopedTemplate:Snd would lead to legal decisions in her favor.Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Harvnb. Chapter 2Template:Snd "Birth Control and Free Speech"Template:Snddescribes how advocacy of free speech was at the heart of the birth control movement.</ref><ref>Template:Harvnb. Book describes the rivalry between Sanger and Dennett.</ref>

Her first brush with censorship came when she wrote a column, What Every Girl Should Know, for the New York Call. Her final article in that series, scheduled for publication on February 9, 1913, discussed syphilis and gonorrhea, so Comstock issued an order prohibiting publication. In response, Sanger and the Call replaced the column with a statement: "What Every Girl Should Know — NOTHING! — by order of the Post-Office Department".Template:Sfn

Sanger's views on free speech were expanded when Emma Goldman introduced Sanger to physician Edward Bliss Foote and lawyer Theodore Schroeder, co-founders of the Free Speech League, in New York.<ref name=FSL>Template:Harvnb.</ref> Inspired by fellow free speech advocates, in 1914 she published The Woman Rebel with the express goal of triggering a legal challenge to the Comstock anti-obscenity laws banning dissemination of information about contraception.Template:Sfn The Free Speech League provided funding and advice to help Sanger with legal battles.<ref name=FSL/>

One of the most formidable opponents to birth control in the 1920s was the Catholic Church, which often tried to prevent Sanger from giving speeches.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Catholics persuaded the Syracuse city council to ban Sanger from giving a speech in 1924; the National Catholic Welfare Conference lobbied against birth control; the Knights of Columbus boycotted hotels that hosted birth control events; the Catholic police commissioner of Albany prevented Sanger from speaking there; and several newsreel companies, succumbing to pressure from Catholics, refused to cover stories related to birth control.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Sanger turned some of the boycotted speaking events to her advantage by inviting the press, and the resultant news coverage often generated public sympathy for her cause.Template:Sfn

Numerous times in her career, local government officials prevented Sanger from speaking by shuttering a facility or threatening her hosts.Template:Sfn In 1929, city officials under the leadership of Boston's Catholic mayor James Curley threatened to arrest her if she spoke.Template:Sfn<ref name="davtom">Template:Cite book</ref> In response she stood on stage, silent, with a gag over her mouth, while Arthur M. Schlesinger Sr. read a statement from Sanger: <templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />

"... I have been gagged. I have been suppressed. I have been arrested numerous times. I have been hauled off to jail. Yet every time, more people have listened to me, more have protested, more have lifted up their own voices. As a pioneer fighting for a cause, I believe in free speech. As a propagandist I see immense advantages in being gagged. It silences me, but it makes millions of others talk and think the cause in which I live."Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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Over the course of her career, Sanger was arrested several times for speaking or publishing prohibited information.<ref>Template:Cite magazine This Time magazine article states eight total arrests in her life. Arrests related to free speech include:
• 1914 arrest for mailing obscene material. Template:Harvnb.
• 1916 arrest in New York for distributing contraceptive pamphlet. Template:Harvnb.
• 1916 arrest in Oregon for distributing obscene material. Template:Harvnb.
• 1921 arrest for obscene speech at a meeting. Template:Harvnb. </ref>

EugenicsEdit

File:MargSanger Cover 1923 UK edition.png

Sanger's 1922 book, The Pivot of Civilization, focused on eugenics.<ref name="BakPC"/>

Template:Further

Eugenics was one of many social reform movements that swept across America during the Progressive Era, which stretched from about 1890 to 1930. During the 1920s, when Margaret Sanger's work was gaining momentum, eugenics was a popular movement, promoted by major organizations, led by intellectuals and scientists, and funded by corporate foundations.Template:Sfn<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }} Major U.S. philanthropies that supported eugenics included Ford, Carnegie, Rockefeller, Kellogg and Sage.</ref><ref>Additional insight into the popularity of eugenics in that era can be found in:
• Template:Harvnb.
• Template:Harvnb.
• Template:Harvnb. </ref>

Eugenic beliefs in the early 1900s covered a wide spectrum: at one extreme were those who overtly claimed the white race was superior, and wanted to reduce the population of certain other ethnicities.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn At the other extreme were altruists who wanted to improve the health and well-being of the entire human race.Template:Sfn<ref name="Kevles">Template:Harvnb. Describes "reform eugenicists" who believed there was no scientific basis for distinguishing races, and doubted that sterilization would have much impact.</ref>Template:Efn Many eugenicists were somewhere between: they did not categorize ethnicities as superior or inferior; but their list of unfit traits included attributes such as illiteracy or low scores on IQ tests whichTemplate:Sndeven if well-intendedTemplate:Sndoften had the effect of targeting certain ethnicities.Template:Sfn

Sanger was surrounded by influential people who approved of eugenics, including close friends Havelock Ellis Template:Sfn Template:Sfn and H. G. Wells,Template:Sfn and colleagues W. E. B. Du Bois Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Cite book.</ref> and Winston Churchill.<ref>Template:Harvnb. Contains a list of notable eugenicists.</ref>Template:Efn Some associates of Sanger used eugenics to support their white supremacist beliefs, including Charles Davenport<ref>Template:Cite book.</ref>Template:Sfn Template:Sfn and Lothrop Stoddard, a member of the KKK, and a founding board member of the ABCL who contributed an article to Birth Control Review.Template:Sfn<ref name="carey">Template:Cite journal Stoddard contributed an article to Birth Control Review, "Population Problems in Asia", in 1922.</ref>

Sanger found common ground between eugenics and her birth control movement: both endeavors would benefit if contraception were legal and readily available.Template:Sfn From her perspective as an activist struggling to develop support for her cause, Sanger viewed the eugenics movement as scientific, respectable, growing, international, and popular.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Sanger adopted eugenics because it was an opportunity to advocate for the legalization of contraceptionTemplate:Sndeugenics was a means to her end.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Whether she genuinely believed in eugenic principles is a matter of debate; several historians conclude that her belief was not sincere, and suggest that she joined with the eugenics movement simply to lend legitimacy to her birth control efforts.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn

Her support of eugenics was first manifested in 1917, when she published an article on eugenics by Paul Popenoe in her periodical Birth Control Review.Template:Sfn From 1919 to 1921 she wrote several articles on the subject, leading to her 1922 book focused on eugenics, The Pivot of Civilization.<ref name="BakPC">Template:Harvnb. "In The Pivot of Civilization [Sanger] embraced eugenics as a female cause with a female solution".</ref>

Sanger's approach to eugenicsEdit

Sanger adopted the fundamental eugenic goal of reducing the number of unfit people. In that group, she included people who were insane, syphilitic, "paupers, morons, feeble-minded, mentally and morally deficient persons"; and included "reckless" people who were incapable of restraining themselves from having an excessive number of offspring.<ref name="EngleUnfit"/>Template:Sfn Template:Efn

To reduce the number of unfit children, Sanger initially emphasized contraceptives, which set her apart from mainstream eugenicists, who preferred sterilization.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn However, when the U.S. Supreme Court decided that involuntary sterilization was legal in 1927, she began to endorse voluntary sterilization (in addition to contraception).Template:Sfn She also began to support involuntary sterilizations in limited circumstances: for parents who were incapable of managing their own fertility and were likely to produce disabled children.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn About 60,000 Americans were sterilized involuntarily between 1927 and World War II.Template:Sfn Template:Efn

Sanger's approach to eugenics was heavily influenced by her feminism, which led her to deviate from mainstream eugenics in several ways:<ref name="BakPC"/>Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Harvnb. "A lifelong campaigner for women’s rights, she gradually abandoned her anarchist and socialist convictions in favor of a distinctly feminist version of eugenics. Frustrated with the lack of interest in women’s reproductive autonomy among feminists and labor activists, Sanger turned to the science of eugenics."</ref><ref>Template:Harvnb. "Sanger's articulation of eugenics was a contradictory mix of adherence to the dominant American version of this ideology and resistance to it."</ref> She supported the right of fit parents to limit the size of their families; whereas mainstream eugenicists felt it was the duty of fit parents to have a large number of offspring.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn And Sanger believed that mothersTemplate:Sndwith some exceptionsTemplate:Sndshould individually regulate their family size; whereas mainstream eugenicists believed government mandates should be employed.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn Template:Efn

Her eugenic proposals did not target specific ethnicities: instead, her goal was to improve the health of the whole human race by reducing the reproduction of those who were considered unfit.<ref name="KBB"/>Template:Sfn<ref>Additional insight into the non-racist nature of Sanger's eugenic policies can be found in:
• Template:Harvnb.
• Template:Harvnb.
• Template:Harvnb.
• Template:Harvnb.
• Template:Harvnb.</ref>Template:Efn When she used the word "race" in the context of eugenics, the word invariably meant the entire human race, rather than a specific ethnicity; when she used the word "unfit" she meant an inherited defect, not an ethnicity.<ref name="EngleUnfit">Template:Harvnb. "It is important to note that Sanger understood 'unfit' to indicate 'physical or mental defects.' She wrote that 'if unfit refers to race or religions, then that is another matter which I frankly deplore.'" (p 133).</ref><ref name="KBB"/><ref>Template:Harvnb. "Sanger never applied the term 'unfit' to entire races or religions."</ref>Template:Efn The consensus of scholars is that Sanger was not racist, but her collaboration with eugenicists indirectly assisted racist causes. Academic Dorothy Roberts, author of Killing the Black Body, wrote "Sanger did not tie fitness for reproduction to any particular ethnic group. It appears that Sanger was motivated by a genuine concern to improve the health of poor mothers she served rather than a desire to eliminate their stock."<ref name="KBB">Template:Harvnb. "Even in her most eugenical book, The Pivot of Civilization, Sanger did not tie fitness for reproduction to any particular ethnic group. It appears that Sanger was motivated by a genuine concern to improve the health of poor mothers she served rather than a desire to eliminate their stock. Sanger believed that all their afflictions arose from their unrestrained fertility, not their genes or racial heritage. For this reason, I agree that Sanger’s views were distinct from those of her eugenecist colleagues. Sanger nevertheless promoted two of the most perverse tenets of eugenic thinking: that social problems are caused by reproduction of the socially disadvantaged and that their childbearing should therefore be deterred."</ref> Roberts' assessment is echoed by other scholars, including scholar Carole McCann,<ref>Template:Harvnb. McCann writes that Sanger stressed limiting the number of births, and to live within one's economic ability to raise and support healthy children, which in her view would lead to a betterment of society and the human race: "although Sanger articulated birth control in terms of racial betterment ... she always defined fitness in individual rather than racial terms."</ref> historian Peter Engelman,<ref>Template:Harvnb. Engelman concluded that Sanger was not a racist, but added: "Sanger quite effortlessly looked the other way when others spouted racist speech. She had no reservations about relying on flawed and overtly racist works to serve her own propaganda needs."</ref> and biographer Ellen Chesler.<ref>Template:Harvnb. "Margaret Sanger was never herself a racist, but she lived in a profoundly bigoted society, and her failure to repudiate prejudice unequivocallyTemplate:Sndespecially when it was manifest among proponents of her causeTemplate:Sndhas haunted her ever since."</ref>

Sanger had affiliated with eugenicists in the hope of gaining their support for her birth control movementTemplate:Sndbut her devotion was not reciprocated: the American Eugenics Society refused to accept any papers submitted by Sanger, most eugenicists ridiculed the birth control movement, and only a few would associate with her.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn The reasons were that Sanger was a woman, she had no academic credentials, and she insisted that mothers should have the power to decide if and when to have children, which ran contrary to the mainstream eugenic policy that the state should order fit women to produce abundant offspring.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn

Legacy and honorsEdit

File:Margaret-Sanger-Square NYC.jpg

This sign in the NoHo neighborhood of New York was present from 1993 to 2021.<ref name="streetSign"/>

Sanger achieved her goal of improving the well-being of women around the world through family planning: contraception is now legal in the U.S., family planning clinics are commonplace, contraception is taught in medical schools, tens of millions of women have made use of Planned Parenthood services, and hundreds of millions of women around the globe have access to birth control pills.Template:Sfn<ref>Planned Parenthood usage estimated from data in:
• {{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}
• {{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }} </ref> As a result, Sanger is viewed today as an important first-wave feminist and a founder and leader of the birth control movement.<ref>Template:Cite book First wave feminist.</ref>Template:Sfn Template:Sfn

Sanger's personal papers are held in two locations: the Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College,<ref>Sofia Smith's Margaret Sanger collection information</ref> and the Library of Congress.<ref>Library of Congress's Margaret Sanger collection information</ref> The papers were curated by the Margaret Sanger Papers Project, led by Esther Katz, which published them in four printed volumes.<ref>NYU Margaret Sanger Papers Project information. Volume 1, Volume 2, Volume 3, and Volume 4.</ref>

Several biographers have documented Sanger's life, including David Kennedy, whose 1970 book Birth Control in America: The Career of Margaret Sanger won the Bancroft Prize and the John Gilmary Shea Prize. Television films Portrait of a Rebel: The Remarkable Mrs. Sanger and Choices of the Heart: The Margaret Sanger Story have portrayed Sanger's life<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Template:Annotated link.</ref> as well as two graphic novels.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Martin Luther King Jr. praised Sanger's work in his acceptance speech for the 1966 Margaret Sanger Award: "[Sanger] went into the slums and set up a birth control clinic, and for this deed she went to jail because she was violating an unjust law.... She launched a movement which is obeying a higher law to preserve human life under humane conditions.... Our sure beginning in the struggle for equality by nonviolent direct action may not have been so resolute without the tradition established by Margaret Sanger."<ref name="MLK">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>Template:Efn

Time magazine designated Sanger as one of the 100 most important people of the 20th century.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> Between 1953 and 1963, Sanger was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize 31 times.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> In 1957, the American Humanist Association named her Humanist of the Year.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> There is a bust of Sanger in the National Portrait Gallery, which was a gift from Cordelia Scaife May.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Smith College awarded Sanger an honorary doctorate degree in 1949.Template:Sfn In 1966, Planned Parenthood began issuing its Margaret Sanger Awards annually to honor "individuals of distinction in recognition of excellence and leadership in furthering reproductive health and reproductive rights".<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>Template:Efn In 1981, Sanger was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> In 1993, the United States National Park Service designated the Margaret Sanger Clinic Template:Sndwhere she provided birth-control services in New York in the mid-twentieth centuryTemplate:Sndas a National Historic Landmark.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Government authorities and other institutions have memorialized Sanger by dedicating several landmarks in her name, including a room in Wellesley College's library,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and Margaret Sanger Square in New York City's Noho area.<ref name="streetSign">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }} The street sign designating "Margaret Sanger Square" was placed in 1993 at the intersection of Bleeker Street & Mott St (the location of Planned Parenthood's Manhattan birth control clinic), and was removed in 2021.</ref> There is a Margaret Sanger Lane in Plattsburgh, New York and an Allée Margaret Sanger in Saint-Nazaire, France.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Sanger, a crater in the northern hemisphere of Venus, is named after her.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Attacks by anti-abortion activistsEdit

Since the legalization of abortion in 1973, Sanger has become a target of frequent attacks by opponents of abortion.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Efn The attacks usually include falsehoods, and they often attribute quotes to Sanger that are either fabricated or presented out of context.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Template:Sfn<ref>Examples of fact-checkers debunking falsehoods related to Sanger:

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|CitationClass=web }}</ref>Template:Efn Common falsehoods are: she was a racist, she was a proponent of abortion, she was a Nazi sympathizer, or she supported the KKK.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn<ref name="oppos"> {{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="NJtruth"> {{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>Template:Efn Another persistent falsehood is the claim that Sanger applied her birth control policies with the intention of suppressing the African American community.<ref name="SangRac">Sanger was a eugenicist, but scholars have concluded that she was not racist, and also concluded that she did not target minority communities. See Template:Harvnb; Template:Harvnb; Template:Harvnb; Template:Harvnb; Template:Harvnb; Template:Harvnb; and Template:Harvnb. For additional details, see the Eugenics section of this article.</ref>Template:Efn

Beginning in 2015, Planned ParenthoodTemplate:Sndhoping to improve relations with minority communitiesTemplate:Sndtook steps to distance itself from its founder: it removed Sanger's name from its annual awards, published an editorial in which it repudiated Sanger's advocacy of eugenics, and removed Sanger's name from its family planning clinic in Manhattan.<ref name="New York Times">Template:Cite news The Times article is discussing a press release issued by the New York City affiliate: {{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }} A year later, the president of the national Planned Parenthood organization published a similar statement: Template:Cite news</ref>Template:Efn Essayist Katha Pollitt and Sanger biographer Ellen Chesner criticized Planned Parenthood for succumbing to pressure from the anti-abortion movement.<ref> Template:Cite news</ref><ref> Template:Cite journal</ref>

WorksEdit

Books and pamphletsEdit

Template:Refbegin

Template:Cite book Originally published in 1911 as a column in the New York Call. The column was based on a set of lectures Sanger gave to groups of Socialist party women in 1910–1911. Multiple editions were published in book form starting in 1912 by Max N. Maisel and Sincere Publishing, with the title What Every Mother Should Know, or how six little children were taught the truth.

Template:Cite book Eighteen editions of this pamphlet were published, including:
• Template:Cite book
• Template:Cite book
• Template:Cite book

Template:Cite book Originally published as a column in 1912-1913; published in book form in 1916.

Template:Cite book Pamphlet.

Template:Cite book Filed with court to support a legal battle.

Template:Cite book Foreword by Havelock Ellis. Published in England with the title The New Motherhood.

Template:Cite book Transcript of a debate between several prominent figures: Sanger, Theodore Roosevelt, Winter Russell, George Bernard Shaw, Robert L. Wolf, and Emma Sargent Russell.

Template:Cite book Entire book reprinted, with commentary and contemporary writings, in Template:Cite book

Template:Cite book A collection of letters women wrote to Sanger; many were initially published in Birth Control Review.

Template:Cite book

Template:Cite book Republished starting in 1971 titled Template:Cite book

Template:Refend

CollectionsEdit

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Template:Cite book

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Letters and articlesEdit

Template:Refbegin

Template:Cite journal
Template:Cite journal Included as chapter 16 in Sanger's 1920 book Woman and the New Race.
Template:Cite journal
Template:Cite journal
Template:Cite news
Template:Cite letter

Template:Refend

PeriodicalsEdit

Template:Refbegin

The Woman RebelTemplate:SndSeven issues published monthly from March 1914 to September 1914. Sanger was publisher and editor. Digital copies of all issues.
Birth Control ReviewTemplate:SndPublished monthly from February 1917 to 1940 (although some issues covered two or three months). Sanger was editor until 1929, when she resigned from the ABCL.<ref name="bcr2"/> Digital copies of volumes 1 to 13 (1917 to 1929).

Template:Refend