In the late nineteenth century, the Comstock Act of 1873 made the distribution of contraception illegal and classified contraception as an obscenity. Reflecting the predominant attitude towards contraception at the time, the Comstock Act was the first federal anti-obscenity law that targeted contraception. However, social acceptance of birth control changed at the turn of the twentieth century. In this thesis, I analyzed legislation, advocates, and literature pertinent to that social change to report on the events leading up to the decriminalization of contraception.

In the early twentieth century, birth control advocate Margaret Sanger published eight issues of a feminist magazine called The Woman Rebel. During this time, discussion of sex education, birth control, and abortion were illegal. The magazine featured literary pieces on topics like women’s rights, love and marriage, women in the workplace, reproductive and sexual education, and contraception. The Woman Rebel was one of the first magazines that discussed issues that working class American women faced. Through the magazine, Sanger sought to convince female readers to reject their oppression and become what she called women rebels. The Woman Rebel generated attention and controversy around the birth control and feminist movements in the United States during the twentieth century, advancing those movements and creating a community of women with the common intent to rebel against apparent injustice.

On 16 October 1916, Margaret Sanger opened one of the first birth control clinics in the United States in Brooklyn, New York, which some have called the Brownsville Clinic. Located at 46 Amboy Street, the clinic was a place where Sanger and her staff verbally communicated with women seeking information about birth control. During the early 1900s, both birth control and abortion were illegal in the US, and publication or circulation of information on both topics was deemed obscene and illegal by the federal Comstock Act. However, women still sought means to control unwanted pregnancies and visited the clinic to learn about birth control. The clinic was open for only ten days. It shut down after being found guilty of violation of the Comstock Act. The Brownsville Clinic represented a step toward the eventual founding of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, which Sanger led. Despite being short-lived, America’s first birth control clinic provided educational resources to women in New York and raised awareness of the birth control movement in the US through media exposure.