Week 9: The Politics of Reproduction

Allison Brown HIST 4990: History of Sexuality Dr. Hampton October 16, 2022 Reading Response - Week 9: The Politics of Reproduction Throughout this week’s readings common themes of eugenics, economics, public perception, and government regulation of sexuality shape our understanding of sexuality and gender dynamics at the start of the Progressive Era. Crucial to the beginning of the nineteenth century is how politics and government regulation interacts with decisions surrounding marriage and reproduction and how these personal decisions more broadly relate to society and economic reproduction in the United States. A statement from Kline in Motherhood, Morality, and the ‘Moron’: The Emergence of Eugenics in America (2001) succinctly summarizes the changes occurring at the start of the Progressive Era with regards to broad changes in society for women, “The ‘new woman’ challenged the existing social order by demanding ‘rights and privileges customarily accorded only to white middle-class men’ … Choosing college and careers over marriage and motherhood, these women violated the 19th century ‘cult of true womanhood’ which placed middle-class women in the home. As a result, they raised questions about gender and morality.” 1 As attitudes surrounding the ‘new woman’ mixed with autonomy in terms of seeking birth control parallel to the development of eugenics and calls to answer the ‘woman question’ and reinstate a way of life led to societal struggles and both an abundance and lack of government regulation. To begin, the start of the nineteenth century presented economic and political challenges to the status-quo of society prior in terms of sex and race. Kline refers to the 1890s as an “outpouring of racism” which alongside economic impacts threatened to annihilate the nineteenth-century ‘cult of the self-made man.” 2 As white middle-class society threatened by external economic factors led to increasing fragility and understandings of whiteness in society, perceived internal threats only increased with the seeming virility of African Americans, immigrants, and the working class which “threatened white middle-class 1 Wendy Kline, “Motherhood, Morality, and the ‘Moron’: The Emergence of Eugenics in America,” in Building a Better Race: Gender, Sexuality, and Eugenics from the Turn of the Century to the Baby Boom (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001) pg. 11 2 Ibid. pg. 8 1 male authority in both power and numbers” and as a result targeted the ‘women adrift’ as the ‘makers of 3 men’ individually responsible for avoiding Roosevelt’s stated “race suicide.” Primarily in this context, women who were not partaking in reproduction were blamed for lacking in their responsibility in society and therefore contributing to the downfall of civilization entirely. In turn, this seeming lack of care from ‘women adrift’ in society, as argued by Kline, led to the popularization and adoption of eugenics to appeal to these women. As Kline states, “By regulating the sexuality of working-class and immigrant women, eugenics would reform the sexual behavior of ‘women adrift’ and limit the procreation of the less ‘civilized’ … in the eugenic version of racial progress, the mother of tomorrow would save civilization from destruction.”4 By distinctly appealing to women in society, eugenics sought to install an image of womanhood that is one intrinsically tied with race and of sound mind as defined by the eugenics movement. By redefining “feeble-mindedness” to a fundamental generic flaw instead of a mental impairment, the eugenics movement was able to construct the “boundaries of mental disability to correlate with standards of social and sexual behavior rather than with standardized levels of mental 5 capability, the newly defined term feeble-minded also defined what constituted normal behavior.” This new definition in ways invited more state intervention and regulation, by seeking out positive eugenics in 6 order to prevent the procreation of women defined as “moron girls.” When positive eugenics failed in the United States, as convincing women to return from being ‘adrift’ or ‘new’, negative eugenics prevailed in some ways as detailed by Roberts “The in Dark Side of Birth Control,” in Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction, and the Meaning of Liberty (1997). Similar to Kline, Roberts examines eugenics in the Progressive Era and the impacts of the economic Depression on perceptions of white, manhood in the US. As detailed by Roberts, African Americans were repeatedly targeted alongside immigrants in both positive and negative eugenic movements at the time. 3 Ibid. pgs. 11, 12 4 Idib. pgs. 16-17 5 Ibid. pg. 25 6 Ibid. pg. 30 2 Roberts discusses the advancements in modern birth control achieved by Margret Sanger, founder of the American Birth Control League, and how her advancements in birth control and its popularity were guided by eugenics. Margaret Sanger perceived the “multiplication of the unfit” to be a “a threat to the political stability of the nation” and argued that “a program of positive eugenics would be unable to 7 present the dangers posed by reckless breeding.” By affirming that positive eugenics would be unable to adequately combat the perceived threat of lesser races or “feeble-minded” people, Sanger essentially endorsed positive eugenics in the US as a means to an end of white supremacy. Moving forward in the text, Roberts analyzes how poor women were more encouraged for sterilization into the near modern day, referring to the Medicaid program’s funding for sterilization of women. Roberts argues, “ selective funding of birth control options takes place within a broader context of misdirected government priorities that emphasize free family planning as a solution to poverty rather than the general improvement of community health.”8 By acknowledging this disconnect between ‘family planning’ and general health, Roberts alludes to the disconnect between government regulation and the actual needs of women in a community in terms of reproductive health, especially in communities of color or lower socioeconomic standing. Briefly returning to the discussion of Margaret Sanger, prior to reading this piece I was unaware of Sanger’s both informal and formal tie to the eugenics movement in the US, and found that to be interesting in terms of how we remember Sanger’s legacy in being a founder of birth control in the US and forming the precursor organization of Planned Parenthood. In some ways, this reminds me of how we collectively historicize the history of gynecology and birth control, as we read and discussed in week six’s readings of Owens’, “Black Women’s Experiences in Slavery and Medicine” (2017) and “Contested Relations: Slavery, Sex, and Medicine” (2017). It is critical to acknowledge the impacts of racism and 7 Dorothy Roberts, “The Dark Side of Birth Control,” in Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction, and the Meaning of Liberty (New York: Pantheon Books, 1997) pg. 73 8 Ibid. pg. 98 3 eugenics on the development of these medical fields, and how today this informs medical decisions and in some ways still continues to perpetuate inequalities in gynecology and obstetrics. Occurring in tandem to growing conversations surrounding eugenics and the role of the ‘new woman’ in society and her reproductive responsibilities, contraception grew widely in popularity across society. In the shadow of the Comstock Act of 1873, all contraception and information about it was technically illegal, leading to misinformation and at times a lack of safety with birth control methods in the twentieth century. Using women’s fears of pregnancy to create higher profit margins, birth control 9 companies continued to sell at high rates in modern society as an option for women. However, as the Comstock Act still forced the development and sale of these ‘feminine hygiene’ products underground, 10 “impeded the development of informed consumerism” and at times led to unsafe practices. To blame for unsafe practices or ineffective methods of birth control was the federal government, as neither the FDA or the FTC was able to regulate the market, again leading to unsafe situations at times. A lack of government regulation in the commercialization of birth control in the 1930s allowed birth control manufacturers to lead the development and use of contraception. By allowing these companies to steer the market, the US government also allowed them to set the standards for contraception and lead prevention measures in broader society, which would have impacts in how the government interacts with these companies in the future and how the opinions and endorsements of organizations and medical professionals shaped commercial contraceptives. As commercial contraception developed and hit the markets, in the early twentieth century, Reagan in‘About to Meet Her Maker’: Women, Doctors, Dying Declarations, and the State’s Investigation of Abortion, Chicago, 1867-1940” (1991) examines how the state utilized “dying declarations” and criminal court proceedings to persecute women and those providing abortion as a means of creating fear for women looking to obtain abortions. More so than actual “punishment” for 9 Andrea Tone, “Contraceptive Consumers: Gender and the Political Economy of Birth Control in the 1930s,” Journal of Social History 29 no. 3 (Spring 1996) pg. 487 10 Ibid. pg. 493 4 women who received abortions, the dying declarations and subsequent publication in the media “implicitly threatened women who had abortions with the danger that they too could be named and exposed in the newspaper. Public exposure of a woman’s abortion—through the press or gossip—served 11 as social punishment of women who had abortions and members of their families.” The publications of these accounts and the press which followed served as a means of social control to discourage women from obtaining abortions. Critical though to the press coverage of an abortion was if it occurred within or outside of marriage. The US was most concerned with abortions which occurred outside of marriage, often the men in those situations would receive more serious “punishments” such as imprisonment or more scrutiny in the press than their married counterparts. As Tone argues, “Criminal abortion investigations reveal the importance of marriage, and especially the lack of it, in the eyes of state officials … the actions of state officials toward unmarried men implicated in criminal abortion deaths reveal the 12 state’s stake in enforcing marriage in cases where an unwed woman became pregnant.” As the state prioritized marriage for reproduction, it did so regarding abortion as well. The impacts of this state control and authority “forcefully reminded all involved not only of the illegality of abortion but also of the power of the state to intervene in the private lives of ordinary people in order to prevent and punish 13 violations of sexual codes that demanded marriage and maternity.” In the cases presented in Reagan’s work we see an abundance of state interference, causing harm. When in terms of the regulation of safety standards of birth control as detailed by Roberts and Tone, perhaps it could be argued that increased state intervention would have upheld safety and efficacy standards. In conclusion, these four readings highlight the impacts of state interference in women’s reproductive health care and perceptions of contraception and abortion. Interfering at this time in those 11 Leslie J. Reagan, “‘About to Meet Her Maker’: Women, Doctors, Dying Declarations, and the State’s Investigation of Abortion, Chicago, 1867-1940,” Journal of American History 77 no. 4 (March 1991) pgs. 1257-1258 12 Ibid. pgs. 1257, 1261 13 Ibid. pg. 1263 5 perceptions guided from the state and other organizations is the role of eugenics and white supremacy, as the US navigates the Progressive Era and attempts to answer the “woman question”. Discussion Questions Tone (1996) writes, “Depression-era manufacturers and retailers of birth control adopted the same consumption/liberation formula to sell women lipstick, Hoover vacuum cleaners, and Chrysler cars to construct the first contraceptive mass market in the US.” (pg. 487) 1.) In what ways does the commercialization of birth control impact other sectors of women’s sales? 2.) Does the decision of companies and cooperations to market to women specifically as the statistical ‘purchasers’ of a household empower women in the marketplace or further exacerbate their economic standing in family units? Kline (2001) writes, “By redefining the boundaries of mental disability to correlate with standards of social and sexual behavior rather than with standardized levels of mental capability, the newly defined term feeble-minded also defined what constituted normal behavior.” (pg. 25) 3.) How do these new definitions and conceptions of normal behavior relate to perceived sexual deviance and sexual orientations we’ve explored previously in class? 4.) Who/what defines normal behavior? How, if at all, does the definition of this behavior impact race, gender, or sexual orientation disproportionately? Planned Parenthood’s website directly addresses Margaret Sanger’s ties to eugenics stating, “She held beliefs that, from the very beginning, undermined her movement for reproductive freedom and caused harm to countless people.” 5.) In what ways does the involvement of eugenics and Sanger’s upholding of white supremacy, and even work with the KKK complicate history of contraception and birth control? 6