Sanger, Margaret

Margaret Sanger (1879–1966) was the most prominent leader of the birth control movement. Her tireless dedication to her ideas enabled her to pursue the legalization, development, and distribution of birth control devices from 1914 until her retirement in 1959. She led the movement almost constantly, all the way from her first challenges to the Comstock Law, which forbade the distribution of information regarding contraceptives, up through the creation of the birth control pill in the 1950s. She was the founder of Planned Parenthood.

See The Margaret Sanger Papers Project for more information on Margaret Sanger.

During the social-justice ferment of 2020, Sanger's enthusiasm for the early twentieth-century eugenics movement became increasingly problematic. In July 2020, Planned Parenthood of Greater New York removed Sanger's name from its Manhattan clinic. Critics of the action noted that eugenics enjoyed broad acceptance among Americans on the right, left, and center during the early twentieth century, and that Sanger's statements on eugenics avoided the overt racism sometimes associated with the movement.