Used by permission from the Arizona Historical Society
"Humanitarian, author, and fearless advocate, your notable contributions
to the improvement of family life and to the study of population problems
have earned the gratitude of people all over the world.”
-- University of Arizona, Honorary Degree Citation
In 1914 Margaret Sanger started a crusade that would generate worldwide
benefits. Influenced by her childhood and her career as a nurse, Margaret
became convinced that family planning was a necessity for the well being
of individual women. She worked throughout the rest of her life to advance
the birth control movement.
A native of New York State, she later adopted Arizona as her home, moving
to Tucson to improve her adult son’s health in 1934. Soon after
her arrival, she worked with local women to found the Mother’s Health
Clinic which distributed contraceptives. A few years later, she
helped Phoenix women to start a birth control clinic in their city, which
opened in 1937. Sanger inspired a group of volunteers who staffed
these clinics, offering women the option of controlling their fertility.
In Tucson, Sanger also raised funds for the Tucson Medical Center and served
on the hospital board, making lasting contributions to improved health
care in southern Arizona.
Margaret Higgins Sanger was born September 14, 1879, one of eleven children
of Michael and Anne Higgins. Margaret watched her mother suffer from
tuberculosis and grow weaker with each pregnancy, eighteen in all. Margaret
attended Claverack College but her education was cut short when her mother
became seriously ill, and she returned home to care for her. Anne
Higgins died at the age of forty-nine.
As a young woman, Margaret worked as a nurse in White Plains, New York. She
married William Sanger, an aspiring artist in 1902. They settled
in Manhattan and then Hastings-on-the-Hudson. Margaret gave birth
to two sons and later a daughter. The Sangers moved back to New
York City, and became involved with the socialist movement. Sanger
wrote articles for the socialist newspaper, Call, including information
about contraceptives.
At this time, the Comstock Law banned the sale, importation, advertisement
and mailing of contraceptives. Disobeying the law, Sanger shared information
about birth control in her magazine The Woman Rebel and later
through a pamphlet entitled “Family Limitations.” After
authorities learned of her actions, Sanger fled to Europe to avoid arrest. She
remained in Europe for over a year, returning home in 1915. Shortly
after Sanger returned, she lost her daughter Peggy to pneumonia.
In 1916, the court postponed Sanger’s trial and later dropped the
charges against her. She continued working for birth control, establishing
clinics for low income women. In 1916, she and her sister, Ethel,
a trained nurse, opened a clinic in New York City. They saw hundreds
of women before a plain-clothed female detective sought advice there, securing
the information needed to raid the clinic. This time, Sanger could
not avoid a jail sentence of thirty days.
After serving her time, Sanger continued working to educate the public
about birth control and to overthrow the Comstock Law. She and William
Sanger had divorced earlier, and she married Noah H. Slee in 1921. Sanger
traveled to Japan and China, speaking about family planning. She
continued to encourage the development of birth control clinics throughout
the U.S.
In the mid-1930s, Sanger again challenged the Comstock law by arranging
to have birth control devices sent from Japan to American Birth Control
League physician Hannah Stone. Since her flight to Europe in 1914,
Sanger had developed international ties which provided access to education
regarding contraceptives and political influence. In this situation,
her contacts in Japan provided a means to ship the diaphragms and challenge
the Comstock Law.
As expected, the United States Customs Service intercepted the package,
resulting in a court battle concerning the rights of physicians to receive
birth control devices through the mail. Judge Augustus Hand heard
the case and ruled against the government on appeal, maintaining that when
the Comstock Law passed in 1873, knowledge about contraception was poor. In
his 1936 ruling, Hand stated that Congress would not have considered birth
control as obscene if lawmakers had possessed present-day facts related
to contraception and pregnancy’s dangers. Hand’s decision
removed all federal bans on birth control, but in practice, it was restricted
to married women who consulted doctors.
Sanger’s work in Arizona inspired volunteers who founded clinics
in Tucson and Phoenix. These clinics eventually became Planned Parenthood
Clinics and continued operating into the twenty-first century.
In Tucson, Sanger lived first in the Santa Catalina foothills. After
Noah Slee passed away in 1942, she moved to a home on Elm Street. In
the early 1950s, she commissioned an architect to build a fan-shaped home
on a nearby lot.
Margaret Sanger enjoyed entertaining in Tucson, painting watercolors and
spending time with her grandchildren. She also used her fundraising
skills to raise thousands of dollars for the Tucson Medical Center and
served on the board of the new hospital.
At the end of her life, Margaret received many honors. In 1952,
she was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, and in 1966 President Lyndon
Johnson awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom. In May of
1965, the University of Arizona presented her with an honorary Doctor of
Humanities degree. Further international recognition came in June
of that year when Japan awarded her its Third Class Order of the Precious
Crown.
Margaret Sanger died on September 6, 1966, after spending her last years
in poor health in a Tucson nursing home.
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