Introduction

Mary Ware Dennett (1872–1947), generally described as Margaret Sanger's chief rival for leadership of the birth control movement, had many of the qualities Sanger's critics have found lacking in Sanger: Dennett never abandoned her commitment to a broad-ranging social justice agenda, and Dennett never accepted that physicians, rather than women themselves, should have control over access to contraception. She framed contraception as a social justice cause in the interest of a democratic, egalitarian society that respected the right of free speech. An admirer of Dennett would say that, unlike Sanger, Dennett never sold out. And yet Dennett, despite persistent efforts, never really came very close to dominating the framing of contraception. A critic of Dennett, then, would say that she was ineffective.

The hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church, on the other hand, is often credited with too much success in opposing Sanger. Sanger herself saw Catholic opposition as a monolith, and Catholic resistance is often enough portrayed as the chief obstacle in the path toward legal, accessible contraception. But, contrary to many analyses, this Catholic opposition does not, on its face, appear to have been particularly successful. In general, Catholic social and political influence in this country grew as the twentieth century progressed; nevertheless, acceptance of contraception also grew during the same period. So contraception seems to be one issue over which Catholic influence was of questionable effectiveness. I argue below that the apparent success of Catholic opposition was, first, less than it seemed.