317. ADVERTISING TO PRODUCE MISCARRIAGE. Every person who wilfully writes, composes or publishes any notice or advertisement of any medicine or means for producing or facilitating a miscarriage or abortion, or for the prevention of conception, or who offers his services by any notice, advertisement, or otherwise, to assist in the accomplishment of any such purpose, is guilty of a felony. APPENDIX NO. 10 INDICATIONS OF OPPOSITION OF BIRTH CONTROL ADVOCATES TO REMOVING BAN ON CONTRACEPTIVE INFORMATION FROM FEDERAL OBSCENITY LAWS At the first American Birth Control Conference when the American Birth Control League was organized in November, 1921, the following resolution was submitted, but the Conference was not allowed to vote upon it: _Whereas_, the proposition has been laid before Post Master General Hays by the Voluntary Parenthood League, that he recommend to Congress the revision of the Federal law so that contraceptive knowledge shall not be included among the penalized indecencies which are now declared unmailable. _Be It Resolved_, that this American Conference for birth control urges Post Master General Hays to act favorably on this proposition as a matter of postal progress and as a service to modern science, welfare and justice. A “doctors only” proponent, speaking from the floor against allowing a vote on this resolution to be taken by the Conference said, “If we could have the Federal bill passed _to-day_, we would not want it.” EXCERPTS FROM AN EDITORIAL IN THE BIRTH CONTROL REVIEW OF MARCH, 1921 In contrast to the State legislation is the proposed repeal of the Federal law, aiming to open the United States mails to the distribution of birth control knowledge by amateurs. We are told that the repeal of the Federal law would be the quickest and shortest way to achieve our goal. But there is no such royal road! We might flood the country with tons of good books and pamphlets on the subject by recognized authorities on hygiene, psychology and sociology, but with no appreciable effect. (A poor woman once said to me, “I have read your book from cover to cover; and yet I am pregnant again.”) To offer a pamphlet to a woman who can not read or is too tired and weary to understand its directions, is like offering a printed bill of fare to a starving man. Yet the repeal of the Federal law would accomplish practically no more than this. Nevertheless, to some it seems of primary importance; and those who think so are best qualified to throw their energies into that work.