On March first Representative Merriam of Locust Grove, New York, moved to suspend the rules and “take from the Speaker’s table and put upon its passage the bill (S. 1572).” Mr. Kerr of Indiana moved its reference to the Judiciary Committee, saying, “Its provisions are extremely important, and they ought not to be passed in such hot haste.” Mr. Cox of New York inquired if debate was in order. The Speaker ruled that it was not. Mr. Merriam moved to suspend the rules and pass the bill. The necessary two-thirds vote to suspend the rules were polled, and the bill was passed without a roll call. _After the passage of the bill_, Mr. Merriam obtained leave to print remarks on it in the Congressional Record. Can any candid reader of the record of how this measure was presented to Congress and passed by the members without debate, possibly assume that the bill was aimed at the complete suppression of access to scientific knowledge for normal use? If that had been the aim of the bill, surely some of the members would have been more insistent than they were upon discussing the provisions of the bill. It is interesting in this connection to note how John S. Sumner, Comstock’s successor, has attempted to refute the criticism that the Comstock bill was passed in careless haste. In a letter which he wrote to Senator Cummins on January 23, 1923, protesting against the Senator’s bill to repeal the Comstock blunder, he gives as his first proof that “this bill was thoroughly considered by some of the most brilliant members of the Senate at that or any other time,” the opening paragraph of Mr. Merriam’s “leave to print” remarks, and states that it was “in the House of Representatives on March 1, 1873” that the Congressman said them. We can give Mr. Sumner the benefit of the doubt that he read the Congressional Record so carelessly that he did not notice that the bill was passed before the Senate could possibly have read Senator Merriam’s arguments urging its passage. But it is also noteworthy that in this letter to Senator Cummins, he omits to state the date (March first) on which the bill was passed. He simply says that it was “subsequently passed by the Senate.” It is also significant that Mr. Sumner puts the Merriam (unspoken) speech at the head of page of excerpts he quotes from the Congressional Record, when as a matter of fact it was the last occurrence in the Senate. It took place after the bill was enacted, and was therefore no factor whatever in its enactment. For some years previous, excellent publications containing contraceptive instructions of a dignified and scientific sort had been increasingly circulated in the United States, notably the book by Dr. Trall which was sold in such quantity in the sixties that it would rank well as a “best seller” in present days. It would also still rank high as authoritative teaching regarding the control of conception if it could be published in full today.