Margaret Sanger’s Eugenics Heyday in the Federal Government
By Susan T Muskett, Public Discourse:
Margaret Sanger’s dream of controlling the fertility of the poor is coming to fruition, thanks to the federal government.
Margaret Sanger was the founder of Planned Parenthood and a population control activist. She advocated that the “unfit”—the poor and the disabled—should have their fertility controlled. In her view, “hap-hazard, uncontrolled parentage leads directly and inevitably to poverty, overcrowding, delinquency, defectiveness, child labor, [and] infant mortality.” Sanger emphasized the financial burden that the marginalized classes impose on the broader society,asserting that “if they are not able to support and care for themselves, they should certainly not be allowed to bring offspring into this world for others to look after.” In other words, to wipe out poverty, society should wipe out the poor—by wiping out the ability of poor people to have children.
These same cost-saving arguments are being used by the federal government to justify targeting low-income women for contraception, especially long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARCs).
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