Quotessence
Home / Authors / Margaret Sanger
Margaret Sanger

Margaret Sanger Quotes

Activist

Filter quotes by topic

AllPlanned ParenthoodEugenicsBirth ControlBirthShouldChildrenWorldHumansPopulationPeopleMotherParenthoodRaceAbortionBornFitSterilizationClassHas BeensIfs

Famous Margaret Sanger Quotes

“The emergency problem of segregation and sterilization must be faced immediately. Every feeble-minded girl or woman of the hereditary type, especially of the moron class, should be segregated during the reproductive periodwe prefer the policy of immediate sterilization, of making sure that parenthood is absolutely prohibited to the feeble-minded.”

ShouldProblemGirlClassPolicyTypeParenthoodEmergenciesSegregationMoronHereditarySterilization
Author:Margaret Sanger
Create image

“Has knowledge of birth control, so carefully guarded and so secretly practiced by the women of the wealthy class - and so tenaciously withheld from the working women - brought them misery? Rather, has it not promoted greater happiness, greater freedom, greater prosperity and more harmony among them? The women who have this knowledge are the women who have been free to develop, free to enjoy in its best sense, and free to advance the interests of the community.”

Has BeensEnjoyInterestCommunityClassGreaterBirthHarmonyMiseryProsperityWealthyBirth ControlGuardedWorking Women
Book:Woman, morality, and birth control
Create image

“We are paying for and even submitting to the dictates of an ever increasing, unceasingly spawning class of human beings who never should have been born at all-that the wealth of individuals and of state is being diverted from the development and the progress of human expression and civilization.”

ShouldHumansHas BeensStatesIndividualBornWealthHuman BeingsClassProgressExpressionDevelopmentCivilizationShould HaveShould Have BeenEugenicsEuthanasia
Book:The Pivot of Civilization in Historical Perspective: The Birth Control Classic
Create image

“In passing, we should here recognize the difficulties presented by the idea of 'fit' and 'unfit.' Who is to decide this question? The grosser, the more obvious, the undeniably feeble-minded should, indeed, not only be discouraged but prevented from propagating their kind. But among the writings of the representative Eugenists [sic], one cannot ignore the distinct middle-class bias that prevails.”

ShouldWritingKindIdeasClassMiddleFitDifficultyObviousPassingPassingsMiddle ClassRepresentativesBiasDiscouragedPlanned Parenthood
Book:The Pivot of Civilization in Historical Perspective: The Birth Control Classic
Create image

“As an advocate of birth control I wish ... to point out that the unbalance between the birth rate of the 'unfit' and the 'fit,' admittedly the greatest present menace to civilization, can never be rectified by the inauguration of a cradle competition between these two classes. In this matter, the example of the inferior classes, the fertility of the feeble-minded, the mentally defective, the poverty-stricken classes, should not be held up for emulation.... On the contrary, the most urgent problem today is how to limit and discourage the over-fertility of the mentally and physically defective.”

ShouldTwoMatterProblemTodayWishClassPovertyExampleBirthFitCivilizationLimitsCompetitionRateContraryInferiorsUrgentDiscouragingCradleEugenicsMenaceBirth ControlFertilityDefectiveInaugurationPlanned ParenthoodEmulationBirth Rate
Author:Margaret Sanger
Create image