Birth control laws : $b shall we keep them, change them, or abolish themDennett, Mary Ware
History
Birth control laws : $b shall we keep them, change them, or abolish them
Dennett, Mary Ware
Birth control; Birth control -- Law and legislation -- United States
Probably most physicians have not yet thought what sort of laws
they want—Resolutions by medical associations depend largely on
way subject is presented and by whom—Doctors have no interest in
retaining obscenity connection, as such—Only few want “doctors
only” bill for mercenary reasons—Endorsement proposed for American
Medical Association in 1920, side-tracked in department—President
of A. M. A. cordial to idea of straight repeal—American Institute
of Homoeopathy and various local medical associations endorse
Cummins-Vaile Bill—Only two medical associations have endorsed
“doctors only” bill—New York Academy of Medicine took “doctors
only” stand on recommendation of small sub-committee when many
members are for straight repeal—Conferences of doctors and lawyers
in Chicago and New York advise against all limited legislation—Dr.
Pusey, President of American Medical Association in 1924, warns
against “silly legislation”—Straight repeal the only recommendation
of conference of doctors and lawyers—Unfair to attempt to
hold medical profession legally responsible for moral use of
contraceptives—Doctors on the whole more interested in professional
prestige and credit for devising contraceptive methods than in any
exclusive control of their use.
II. WHAT DO THE PEOPLE WANT? 241
People’s first individual want is reliable contraceptive
information—Strong probability that people prefer decent enforceable
laws to those which are dirty and unenforceable—Choice can not be
put up to United States town-meeting fashion—Reader asked to make
own choice by elimination of what he does not want—Do you consider
contraception indecent?—Should laws penalize the decent majority in
order to reach the depraved few?—Should the control of conception
itself be made a criminal act by law?—Abstinence as method of birth
control has no legal standing in the U. S.—Do you want unenforceable
laws?—Can “doctors only” laws accomplish their own aims?—Are
they enforceable?—Do all contraceptives require personal medical
instruction?—Proponents of “doctors only” bill admit that they do
not—English birth control organizations disapprove “doctors only”
stand—Best known English authority on birth control is biologist,
not M.D.—Are laws to curb improper advertising of contraceptives
practicable?—Average citizen too occupied to analyze legislative
proposals—Proponents of limited legislation backward about
explaining their bills to the public—They refuse to debate openly or
confer privately with proponents of freedom bill.
III. CAN THE PEOPLE GET WHAT THEY WANT? 262
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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