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Monday January 17, 1916
Brooklyn, New York - Elizabeth Gurley Flynn Lectures on Limitation of Birth

Saturday's Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported that the I. W. W. organizer, Gurley Flynn, addressed a Brooklyn audience Friday evening on the subject of birth control. As is usual when covering events conducted by members of the Industrial Workers of the World, the Eagle must first begin by mocking the event before briefly describing Miss Flynn's presentation:

FEE ROUTS AUDIENCE AT FLYNN SEX TALK
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Girl Orator's Listeners, Mostly Juveniles,
Exit When Money Is Sought.
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About a half-hundred half-grown boys and girls with a sprinkling of adults listened with avid interest to a talk by Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, the I. W. W. leader, on the subject of limitation of births last night. The meeting was held in Plaza Hall, Grand and Havemeyer streets, with the avowed intention of teaching poor mothers to improve their economic condition. The interest continued until an effort was made to collect the 15-cent fee, with which it was hoped to defray the expenses of the lecture, when there was a rush to get out.

The lecturer scheduled for the evening was Mrs. Margaret H. Sanger, who is expounding her doctrine on the subject taken up by Miss Flynn in various parts of the country. She was ill, however, and could not keep her engagement. Dr. Frank Harris made an address touching upon the same subject from the view point of a medical practitioner. Dr. Joseph Slavitt presided.

Miss Flynn made a number of statements in connection with the social evil, and its alleged relation to large families. She also ascribed the world war in part to the "evil" of unlimited births and made a prediction of an era of vice to follow it. She also denounced the Federal authorities for "persecuting" Mrs. Sanger because of her views. Mrs. Sanger is to be arraigned before Federal Judge Clayton on Tuesday.

It was expected that a large crowd would turn out in honor of the woman Socialist, and Police Captain Shaw appeared on the scene with a squad of men. The adult attendance was so meager, however, that he quickly recalled his men.

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[Photograph of Miss Flynn added.]

From The Public of January 14, 1916:

Margaret Sanger's Case.

The following statement of the case against her was issued on January 5 by Mrs. Margaret H. Sanger, wife of William Sanger, the architect, recently sent to jail through plotting of the late Anthony Comstock:

I returned to this country on October 6th—four days before William Sanger was released from jail. On the sixth of November, my little daughter died from pneumonia.

A few days after my arrival, I informed the United States Attorney of my presence, asking him if the indictments issued against me a year ago were still pending, inasmuch as the issue on which I am indicted—birth control—has been so thoroughly discussed during the past year in the various journals and magazines throughout the United States, and also inasmuch as no editor or publishers have been indicted. He replied that the indictments were still pending. The case was called for trial at the end of December, and postponed until January 4th. It is now set for Tuesday, January 18th, and will positively be tried on that date.

The opportunity was offered me to plead guilty, thereby ensuring my release after payment of a small fine. I refused to do this, because the whole issue is not one of a mistake, whereby getting into jail or keeping out of jail is of importance, but the issue involved is to raise the entire question of birth control out of the gutter of obscenity into the light of human understanding.

The present indictments are based on twelve articles published in "The Woman Rebel," eleven of which discuss birth control. The twelfth Is a philosophic defence of abortion. My case differs from William Sanger's in this respect—that these indictments do not (in my opinion) violate the law. No question of distributing information in regard to the prevention of conception is at present involved.

I shall go into court on January 18th without an attorney, because I cannot find any lawyer whose mental attitude toward this case is right.

I appeal to you to give me your moral and financial support at this time. Write letters to Judge Clayton, of the United States District Court, Post Office Building, New York City, before whom the case is to be tried. Write letters to newspapers. Hold protest meetings and send resolutions to your Congressmen and to the President of the United States. Raise funds for publicity. Address all communications to me at 26 Post Avenue, New York City.

[Photograph of Margaret Sanger added.]

In her controversial pamphlet, Sabotage, which was published by the I. W. W. last April, Miss Flynn addressed the issue of birth control as form of sabotage that could strike at the very root of the capitalist system.

LIMITING THE OVER-SUPPLY OF SLAVES
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It is my hope that the workers will not only "sabotage" the supply of products but also the over-supply of producers. In Europe the syndicalists have carried on a propaganda that we are too cowardly to carry on in the United States as yet. It is against the law. Everything is "against the law," once it becomes large enough for the law to take cognizance that it is in the best interests of the working class.

If sabotage is to be thrown aside because it is construed as against the law, how do we know that next year free speech may not have to be thrown aside? Or free assembly or free press. That a thing is against the law does not mean necessarily that the thing is not good. Sometimes it means just the contrary: a mighty good thing for the working class to use against the capitalists. In Europe they are carrying on this sort of limitation of product: they are saying,

Not only will we limit the product in the factory, but we are going to limit the supply of producers. We are going to limit the supply of workers on the market.

Men and women of the working class in France and Italy and even Germany today are saying,

We are not going to have ten, twelve and fourteen children for the army, the navy, the factory and the mine. We are going to have fewer children, with quality and not quantity accentuated as our ideal who can be better fed, better clothed, better equipped mentally and will become better fighters for the social revolution.

Although it is not a strictly scientific definition, I like to include this as indicative of the spirit that produces sabotage. It certainly is one of the most vital forms of class warfare there are, to strike at the roots of the capitalist system by limiting their supply of slaves and creating individuals who will be good soldiers on their own behalf.

[Photograph and paragraph breaks added.]

SOURCES

The Brooklyn Daily Eagle
(Brooklyn, New York)
-Jan 15, 1916
https://www.newspapers.com/image/55570139/

The Public
(Chicago, Illinois)
-Jan 14, 1916
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=QZJGAQAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcove...
"The Margaret Sanger Case"
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=QZJGAQAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcove...

Words on Fire, The Life and Writing of Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
-ed by Rosalyn Fraad Baxandall
Rutgers University Press, 1987
https://books.google.com/books/about/Words_on_fire.html?id=mqbaAAAAMAAJ

IMAGES
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Marxist org
https://www.marxists.org/subject/women/authors/flynn/
Margaret Sanger (1879-1966)
https://www.nwhm.org/education-resources/biography/biographies/margaret-...
Sabotage by Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, April 1915
http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015079021849;view=2up;seq=1;...

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The Pill - Loretta Lynn

You've set this chicken your last time
Cause now I've got the pill.
-Loretta Lynn

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DcdONaKSQM width:560 height:315]