Birth Control: Past and Present

Contraceptive techniques have been traced back to Ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome. The modern movement of birth control began in Great Britain where the writings of Thomas Robert Malthus stirred interest in the problem of overpopulation. The first birth control was founded in 1878 in Amsterdam by a woman called Aletta Jacobs. Aletta and Margaret Sanger were advocates of birth control so they were trying to develop clinics and promote birth control. In 1914, Margaret Sanger was arrested for publishing information about birth control in her magazine Women Rebel. She became America’s most influential advocate of birth control in the 1910’s. In 1921, another birth control advocate named Marie Stopes, along with the Malthusian League, established a birth control in London. In the United States, the first birth control clinic was opened in 1916 by Margaret Sanger in New York. The clinic was soon closed, but the police and Margaret received a thirty-day jail sentence. Soon after, in 1917 she helped organize the National Birth Control League, but in 1921 it became known as the American Birth Control League. Later, in 1942 it became the notorious Planned Parenthood Federation of America and in 1961 the Planned Parenthood World Population.

Throughout the 1940’s and 1950’s birth control advocates were engaged in numerous legal suits. In 1965, Connecticut was one of the only states that prohibited the use of contraceptives.

It wasn’t until 1967, when the federal government became being more active in the birth control movement. Six percent of the funds of the Child Health Act were set aside for family planning. In 1970, the family planning services and Population Act provided separate funds to support birth control. The first country to provide government assistance for birth control was Sweden. In Japan, the birth control programs helped reduce dramatically the birthrates.

Birth control and sex education in schools continue to be emotional issues in the United States, where teen pregnancy and sexual activity rates are high. The Roman Catholic Church has provided the main opposition to the birth control movement.

The practice of contraception is to limit reproduction.