Most of the women of the middle and upper classes in America seem
secure in their knowledge of contraceptives as a means of birth
control. Under present conditions, when the laws in most states regard
this knowledge, howsoever it be imparted, as illicit, and the federal
statutes prohibit the sending of it through the mails, even the women
in more fortunate circumstances sometimes have difficulty in getting
scientific information. Nevertheless, so strong is their purpose that
they do obtain it and use it, correctly or incorrectly.
The great majority of women, however, belong to the working class.
Nearly all of these women will fall into one of two general groups--the
ones who are having children against their wills, and those who,
to escape this evil, find refuge in abortion. Being given their choice
by society--to continue to be overburdened mothers or to submit to a
humiliating, repulsive, painful and too often gravely dangerous
operation, those women in whom the feminine urge to freedom is
strongest choose the abortionist. One group goes on bringing children
to birth, hoping that they will be born dead or die. The women of the
other group strive consciously by drastic means to protect themselves
and the children already born.
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