Margaret Sanger: an Autobiography

Sanger's general interest in sex education and women's health focuses on family, marriage and motherhood. As a nurse she saw graphic examples of the toll taken by frequent childbirth, miscarriage, and self-induced abortion. With access to contraceptive information prohibited on grounds of obscenity by state and federal laws, Sanger realized that many less well-off women did not have freedom from the physical hardships, fear, and dependency inherent in unwanted pregnancy. Awakened to the connection between contraception and working-class empowerment, Sanger became convinced that liberating women from the risk of too many unwanted pregnancies would effect fundamental social change in allowing women to claim their reproductive rights. She was never an advocate of abortion but of birth control. Sanger launched a campaign challenging governmental censorship of contraceptive information by embarking on a series of law-defying confrontational actions designed to force birth control into the center of public debate and eventual accessibility for all women.