'The Clogs and Destroyers of Civilization'

(Another book chapter finished! Yay! Here's an unedited excerpt that ties in with the current focus on abortion. I look forward to your feedback. I've opened the comments function; comments are moderated.)

Margaret Sanger was the founder of the modern birth control movement and a vocal proponent of eugenics—the theory of race improvement that was the cornerstone of Nazi Germany. Sanger believed that all evils stemmed from large families, especially large families of those she deemed as unfit. As she wrote in her 1920 book, Woman and the New Race, “The most merciful thing that a large family does to one of its infant members is to kill it.”

I can’t even fathom saying such a thing, but Sanger’s personal history undoubtedly influenced her thinking. She was born in 1879 in Corning, New York, the sixth of eleven surviving children. Her father was a stonemason and a supporter of radical socialist causes. Sanger’s mother succumbed to tuberculosis at 49. Sanger later said the strain of 18 pregnancies was what broke her mother’s health. 

Sanger went on to study nursing and married in 1902. Her first pregnancy was a difficult one that landed her in a sanitarium for her confinement and recovery. But she regained her health and gave birth to two more children. In 1910, she began to work as a midwife and home nurse on the Lower East Side of New York City. A year later, she joined a radical labor movement and participated in several labor strikes.

By 1912, Sanger began writing a series of articles on female sexuality and contraception in the socialist publication, The Call, in bold defiance of then-current law against the dissemination of information on sexually transmitted diseases and contraception. Two years later, separated from her husband whom she would later divorce, she founded the monthly magazine, Woman Rebel, under the slogan, “No gods; no masters!”  In 1914, she fled to Europe after she was indicted for violating U.S. postal obscenity laws. But two years later, having avoided imprisonment, she was back in the U.S. to open the nation’s first birth control clinic, in Brooklyn, New York. After ten days of operation, she was arrested and jailed. The trial made her a national figure, and handed doctors the right to prescribe birth control advice.

In 1921, Sanger organized the American Birth Control League, which later became the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. For Sanger, the birth control movement was founded on two goals: limiting the reproduction of the “unfit” and challenging Christian teaching by creating a “new morality.” She campaigned against women “with staggering rapidity” breeding “those numberless, undesired children who become the clogs and the destroyers of civilization.”  Sanger’s scorched-earth writing left no one guessing about her views:

While unknowingly laying the foundations of tyrannies and providing the human tinder for racial conflagrations, woman was also unknowingly creating slums, filling asylums with insane, and institutions with other defectives. She was replenishing the ranks of the prostitutes, furnishing grist for the criminal courts and inmates for prisons. Had she planned deliberately to achieve this tragic total of human waste and misery, she could hardly have done it more effectively. 

[T]he most urgent problem to-day is how to limit and discourage the over-fertility of the mentally and physically defective. Possibly drastic and Spartan methods may be forced upon American society if it continues complacently to encourage the chance and chaotic breeding that has resulted from our stupid, cruel sentimentalism. 

She was equally as caustic about Christianity and the Bible’s teaching on sexuality:

Let it be realized that this creation of new sex ideals is a challenge to the church. Being a challenge to the church, it is also, in less degree, a challenge to the state. The woman who takes a fearless stand for the incoming sex ideals must expect to be assailed by reactionaries of every kind. Imperialists and exploiters will fight hardest in the open, but the ecclesiastic will fight longest in the dark. He understands the situation best of all; he knows what reaction he has to fear from the morals of women who have attained liberty. For, be it repeated, the church has always known and feared the spiritual potentialities of woman’s freedom.

When women have raised the standards of sex ideals and purged the human mind of its unclean conception of sex, the fountain of the race will have been cleansed. Mothers will bring forth, in purity and in joy, a race that is morally and spiritually free.

I think it’s safe to say that with the perspective of nearly a century of hindsight, we have hardly attained a cleansed human race that is morally and spiritually free. To expect this kind of salvation from women is unwise, unbiblical, and downright impossible. As we will see in a following chapter, women did not manage to raise the sex standard—in fact, third-wave feminism gave rise to the feminine “raunch culture” we live in today. Yet, Sanger was so confident about the fruits of birth control and the new race that she predicted exactly the opposite of what has come to pass:

When motherhood becomes the fruit of a deep yearning, not the result of ignorance or accident, its children will become the foundation of a new race. There will be no killing of babies in the womb by abortion, nor through neglect in foundling homes, nor will there be infanticide. . . .

The relentless efforts of reactionary authority to suppress the message of birth control and of voluntary motherhood are futile. The powers of reaction cannot now prevent the feminine spirit from breaking its bonds. When the last fetter falls the evils that have resulted from the suppression of woman’s will to freedom will pass. Child slavery, prostitution, feeblemindedness, physical deterioration, hunger, oppression and war will disappear from the earth. . . . When the womb becomes fruitful through the desire of an aspiring love, another Newton will come forth to unlock further the secrets of the earth and the stars. There will come a Plato who will be understood, a Socrates who will drink no hemlock, and a Jesus who will not die upon the cross. (emphasis added)

God forbid. God forbid!

I type that quote with tears on my cheeks. Without the cross, we are doomed. There is no hope of a new heavens and a new earth, free from the effects of the fall, without the atonement of our sinless Savior. There is no hope for mercy to triumph over judgment unless it be at the foot of that cross. There is no hope for “child slavery, prostitution, feeblemindedness, physical deterioration, hunger, oppression and war to disappear from the earth” if the Father’s righteous anger against these terrible sins is not satisfied. Where would justice be in the universe if such sins go overlooked? No, on the contrary, our only hope is the cross! If Jesus had not been obedient to this plan of salvation, who could possibly be our mediator?

And who could possibly atone for the slaughter that eventually arose from this “new morality”?

Margaret Sanger lived to see the development of the first birth control pill in 1960—something she had worked toward. She died in 1966, the year the Johnson administration incorporated “family planning” into its foreign policy and domestic health and social welfare programs of the United States.  Her life bridged the first and second waves of feminism, but her philosophies were the booster rocket for the most profound effects of second-wave feminism.

Comments

[Heidi]

I really apreciate reading your blog and posts like these. :)

As I was reading it occured to me that if you haven't already it may be beneficial to read Randy Alcorn's book "Does the Birth Control Pill Cause Abortions?" You can read it online for free at the Eternal Perspectives website http://www.epm.org/bcp.html .

I recently discovered this information and was quite shocked. I immediately passed on the information to two of my married friends who have been using birth control pills, and both were surprised and angered...one of them then shared the information with her husband and they were both in full agreement to stop taking them. I was so blessed to see God work in such ways.

I was thinking it might be in line of your book and/or this blog if you were to write about it, because it's information that I believe every godly young woman should be aware of.

Thank you for remaining faithful in the work of the Lord!

Heidi

[Libby Guidry]

Unbelievable and infuriating and grieving all at the same time. Margaret Sanger's line of thinking is still alive and well today as I just recently got to experience first hand. A friend of mine sent an email out recently from Focus On The Family informing folks of how the two democratic presidential nominees vote on abortion and homosexual marriages. Nothing inflammatory or incendiary about it. I forwarded it to several friends thinking everyone would like to see this info. Well, lo and behold, one of my friends sent this scathing reply, "This is exactly the kind of intolerance, hate and prejudice that is the disgusting hypocrisy of the church and the church-goers alike. I don't recall the words 'love thy neighbor as thyself except for those you deem unworthy'. Do you? Everyone matters...not just those whom you choose. We are all in this together whether you like it or not. Accept reality...don't resist what is! And, if you are against abortion, don't have one. But don't tell me that I can't." Wow! I was stunned. But, I do remember being lost and thinking this very same way.
Thanks Ms. Sanger...

[Molly]

Hi Carolyn,
I enjoy your blog, it is interesting and well written. I have great difficulty with the eugenics movement as I have mobility problems which arose from an inherited genetic condition. In my working life I work for an organisation which cares for children and adults with severe intellectual disabilities.
Despite the above I think it is unwise to regard birth control as a bad thing, it allows women to enjoy married life without fearing pregnancy. Many women cannot cope with large numbers of children for emotional, financial and health reasons. I feel Christian women who lived prior to the advent of contraception faced challenges we in the 21st century would find daunting.
God bless your work

[Melissa]

A few weeks before my wedding night, I went to the doctor to get some birth control pills. With all the health risks involved, I decided to do a little more research on my own. That is when I found the birth control pill to be abortive and thank God, I never used the product. In my experience though, many, many women though who profess to be christian and would call themselves pro-life use the pill unknowingly.

At the time that I uncovered the truth about the birth control pill, I had a much more shocking discovery. Many women who I would say genuinely live for Christ blatantly use the pill. The attraction is great. It is convenient and so effective. But more than these things I think it is that they know women in christian circles whose judgment they respect who use it or who have used it(many times in ignorance). But these young women reason it away. Most doctors won't tell you the complete physiology of how the pill works and even if they do, they will simply say that it is non-abortive. Most doctors don't believe a child is a child until they are implanted or later even. So they see their christian rolemodels using it, and they hear the doctor telling them it's fine, it becomes hard for them to look clearly at the facts. They sin because they deceive themselves into thinking somehow it can't possibly matter to God.

It is just so crucial that we as christians VALUE LIFE SO DEARLY! We are accountable to God for what we do with the lives of others, especially the helpless unborn baby!

I think apart of the problem is that there is not enough clear talk on the matter. Maybe you could touch on this issue of christian compromise in your book?

[Jessica]

I am so happy to see a discussion on birth control and on the pill! It has been a concern on my mind, primarily because I have never been able to find 100% assurance that the pill is not abortive and secondarily because of the side-effects and health risks it causes in women. I had not heard of Randy Alcorn's book, but plan to get and read it - thank you for posting that comment. I have been happily practicing NFP from the beginning with my husband who has never been supportive of the pill and never wanted me to go on the it because of the unknown possiblity of abortion. I think a lack of understanding of how the pill works has lead Christians to use this form of birth control and my hope would be that more Christians would take the opportunity to become more educated on this subject. I think it is very sad what drove Sanger's desire to educate women on the use of birth control, because in and of itself, I don't believe it is a bad thing, unless , of course, abortion or preventing implantation is involved. I believe it is what is in your heart that drives whether or not the appropiate use of birth control is glorifing to the Lord.
Thank you for another provoking post, Carolyn! I can't wait to read your book when it comes out!

[Trish Ryan]

Would it be possible for you to interview some folks who grew up in large families (both Christian and non) to get the perspective of what it's like to walk that? I'm close with a woman in her 60s who was one of 11 children. Her mother also had numerous miscarriges, and eventually lost her sanity from all the stress of raising children under what was then the considerable pressure of the Catholic church. Because of what she saw in her family, my friend did not want a large family, and has never found her way back to any church because of what this did to her mother. I'm not sure we can judge Sanger, or anyone, based on historical account rather than personal conversation. Your chapter might be enhanced by some consideration of why abortion and birth control seem like such "good news" to some people.

[Susanna Rose]

Thank you for focusing so much on the subject of abortion lately! I find your blog such an amazing encouragement in my life and also feel challenged by it in my Christian walk.

As a mother of one, going on two and the daughter of a mom who spent many years working for the pro-life movement, keeping people aware of the abortion issue is one of the passions of my life. I appreciate the many facets of the pro-choice movement you are discussing, including this interesting info on Margaret Sanger.

[Jennifer]

A fantastic blog. I worked at a Crisis Pregnancy center a few years ago and did some reading on M. Sanger during that time. The total blindness and deception under which she lived is mind boggeling. After our first child was born a midwife asked me upon my first check-up after the birth what form of birth control I was planning on using and told me about this "wonderful lady named Margaret Sanger to whom we are so greatly indebted for our current birth control options." Very sad.

It's my understanding, if I remember correctly, that Planned Parenthood works hard to keep her past "under wraps" as much as possible...

[Andrea C.]

I know I'm getting off-topic somewhat, but in response to the previous comments, I would like to draw attention to a fabulous method of contraception that allows women to avoid the pill. While I dislike the pill in particular, I do agree with Molly that birth control, broadly speaking, is not a wholly negative thing.

I was on the pill for one year in college to regulate my cycle. I tried two different kinds -- the first left me depressed (I felt as though my personality had been altered), and the second left me irritable on a constant basis. So when I came to be married, I knew that I'd want to avoid the pill (I also worry about the long-term health effects). Through my soon-to-be sister-in-law, I discovered Lady Comp. It's essentially natural family planning, but takes away the pressure to keep all those charts and information yourself. I've used Lady Comp successfully thus far for nearly a year and a half. I'm so pleased with this investment. I'd highly recommend it to any woman who feels that she can't take the pill (health or conscience objections) but still desires to exercise stewardship over the timing of children.

http://www.raxmedical.com/index.php

[Rebecca Stewart]

I'm glad to see such open discussion on this topic. I think it might be important in your chapter to discuss "natural" versus "barrier" versus "chemical" birth control. The issue with chemical birth control is that it is unclear that its nature is truly contraceptive and may be abortive in some instances. From what I've read, many Christian organizations have embraced "natural" birth control such as NFP or FAM as ethical ways to time pregnancy. I was on the pill for a number of years due to the fact that I suffer from dysmenorrhea. I've been off the pill for a year now because of the fact that of all 4 varieties that I had been given, they all caused me depression. This is a little known side-effect. During the time that I was researching possible side effects of the pill, I came across several articles that described NFP and FAM as legitimate substitutes. I took a look at them out of curiosity. Let me just say there is a wealth of information out there about our own bodies that most women don't know but would find helpful. I don't need birth control as a form of contraceptive, but I've found some of the techniques used in NFP and FAM to be wonderful for tracking why I get moody at certain times, and for timing my cycles. Just some input.

[Jane]

Dear Carolyn,

thank you so much for writing about this - it's not just another ethics argument! Thank you for never excluding 'heart' from your blogs!

I am a pre-med student, and possibly the hardest lectures I had to sit through last year were those regarding embryogenesis - how an embryo is formed, and the stages 'it' has to go through before it becomes a fetus.

Hard, because I got to see so many who couldn't see the hand of the Creator. Heart-breaking, because here were a group of people wanting to help others in society, given the ability to do so by God, but were not able to recognize it.

Whilst I sat in wonder of the amazing way God brings about a new life (how complex, how beautiful!), so many of my friends around me were noting the chemicals involved, the timeline of cell-splitting and differentiation...

God is LORD - the Creator of all things.

"Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule... God blessed them and said to them, 'Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it." (Gen 1:26-28)

God made humans rulers over the world He created, and as stewards we have responsibility! It does mean considering practicalities such as finances and emotional and physical states (as mentioned in a comment above). I haven't thought much about birth control or the implications for a married Christian couple much; the thing that hit me most from this blog was how we have become so arrogant as to take our Saviour completely out of the picture, thinking that with human wisdom, we can change the world! "To fear the LORD is the beginning of wisdom".

Where there are sinners, there is sin - and there is no removal of sin without Christ. No amount of birth control will solve the world's problems.

Thank you again, Carolyn, for using your blog to encourage us to be aware of things going on in the world around us.

[jenny]

Fascinating and disturbing reading. I'm not from the US and hadn't ever heard of Sanger. I must say it's also been great to read the discussion in the post replies. What a terrific community surrounds this blog.
Something that grieves me about this material (apart from Sanger's obviously Godless and hostile writing) is that Sanger and other feminists were responding to the sometimes awful conditions women faced on a micro and macro level ie. in their daily lives, and in society. I know from direct evidence that women's lives were difficult if they lacked the knowledge to prevent constant pregnancy (and lacked a sensitive husband!). Other than at the highest levels of society, women were forced to stay in violent, abusive marriages, lacked any kind of financial independence, and were not all that long ago, chattels of marriage, with no vote and no voice.
Women were in many ways second class citizens - and in some places and in many ways, still are.

So I understand what drove articulate women who saw the evidence of this all around them, to want to do something about it. The same anger at injustice and inhumanity to man drives me today!! A great aunt of mine was a suffragette. But as Carolyn so rightly said, "[w]ithout the cross, we are doomed." Action against injustice has to be under God, or there is a risk it will be perverted.
I am looking forward to this book VERY much!
Blessings to Carolyn as you write.
Jenny

[Christian lady]

I think the problem, is that for many families especially in her generation, that had recurrent pregnancies, the results were horrific. There was no support, poverty, abuse, children being taken into homes etc. People always say "in the good ol' days extended families helped" and actually that isn't necessarily true. I have family members that were raised in institutions due to extreme poverty brought about by 10, 12, 15, 19 children in the family. This was during the war with rations, they remember eating out of bins, being taken from their parents etc.
As a Christian woman, I will never use the birth control pill as a contraceptive measure, even knowing my own families history. Having said that, I know that 99% of my Christian friends, from well off, middle class 2 or 3 kids in the family do and will continue to. I brought up this issue the other night at a Christian woman's meeting and every single one said that it was nonsense to have more than 2 or 3 children and the pill is 100% fine. These are women who talk about the soverignty of God, who believe, who raise their children to believe and yet, they hold onto this and all use the pill.
I'm praying about what is the right choice re fertility, I know other Christians who use natural methods (time of the month, ovulation kits etc) or whether to leave it all up to God. Having said that, the few families I know who do not use any form of contraception even natural ones, have good financial standing, live in very cheap parts of the US, have been able to afford to buy a home outright i.e. no mortgage, have had good deliveries, have families that support financially (one who is pregnant with 4th child's parents bought them a 25K van) don't have major health problems and don't have chldren with dissabilities. So, while I don't mean to say "it's easier for them" the reality is that it is. I personally would rather not use any form of birth control, but I know due to a medical condition, Dr's may say to me that a certain number of pregnancies is my limit.
I also think a lot about adoption when I think about birth control. There are hundreds of thousands of children in the US and millions in the world who need loving families. I wish more Christians would adopt as well.

[NKJ]

I know this post was mainly on abortion but what are your thoughts on birth control? They are different topics but I think the same threads of morality, sanctity of life, and God's guidance run through both of them.

I am not married yet but this is something I go back and forth with (I am not Catholic). It wasn't until 1930 that the Anglican church allowed birth control "when there is a clearly felt moral obligation to limit or avoid parenthood and where there is a morally sound reason for avoiding complete abstinence." Over the next 30 years, the other Protestant churches followed.

I think that in an ideal situation, God would give me and my future husband the exact number of children he would want us to had. Yet, my mind often struggles with the practicality of this (I want perhaps 4-5 children but having more than that is a little scary).

[militarywifey]

Actually, I have a Master's in Statistics.

There is no statistical research that concludes that the birth control pill causes abortions. Actually, many pro-life physicians continue to reccommend it because the claim that it causes abortions is largely unfounded and highly theoretical.

The chances of a perfect pill-taker breakthrough ovulating are extremely low (in Combined Oral Contraceptives, at least). Other contraceptive effects have not been accurately studied and the theory of how many abortions exactly the pill has caused is numbers based on theory, with no factual support.

Now, I respect that some women have issues with the pill and that is ok. But to claim that the pill is an abortifacient based on scientific fact is largely unfounded. I have read Randy Alcorn's book and found much statistical error in the reporting of the different contraceptive effects of the pill. I think the book has a good start but more investigation needs to be done to prove one way or the other.

I was on the pill for 3 years and I never ovulated. When I tried to conceive afterwards, I began to notice the symptoms of my ovulation. They were impossible to ignore and I knew that while on the pill my body had suspended ovulation. In most cases, I believe this to be true.

However, I do believe there may be a very small number of women where the pill may not work as good as a true contraceptive. And I believe God does put conviction on our hearts if we are one of those women. With a perfect-pill taker (same time every day) this is rare, but I guess it could still happen. If you, personally, don't believe the pill to be right, then perhaps you shouldn't take it. There is nothing wrong with this action.

However, I don't believe there is any wrong in taking the pill if you truly believe in your heart that it acts as a contraceptive and not an abortifacient. If you are familiar with your ovulation signals and notice that while on the pill you exhibit none, all the pill is doing is preventing ovulation.