Chapter XXXV: Section 2: A Scandalous Suggestion

The foregoing opinions are very distasteful to Neo-Malthusians, and these people, being unable apparently to give a reasoned answer, do not hesitate to suggest that medical opposition, when not due to religious bias, is certainly due to mercenary motives.

"As the Church has a vested interest in souls, so the medical
profession has a vested interest in bodies. Birth is a source of
revenue, direct and indirect. It means maternity fees first; it
generally presupposes preliminary medical treatment of the expectant
mother; and it provides a new human being to be a patient to some
member of the profession, humanly certain to have its share of
infantile diseases, and likely, if it survives them, to produce
children of its own before the final death-bed attendance is
reached." [70]

That scandalous suggestion has recently been repeated by the President of the Society for Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress under the following circumstances. On October 31, 1921, the _Sussex Daily News_ published the following paragraph from its London correspondent.

"BIRTH CONTROL

"Reverberations of Lord Dawson's recent sensational address to the
Church Congress on birth control are still being felt as well in
medical as in clerical circles. Indeed, the subject has been discussed
by the lawyers at Gray's Inn. The London Association of the Medical
Women's Federation had so animated a discussion on it that it was
decided to continue it at the next meeting. It is quite evident that
Lord Dawson did not speak for a united medical profession. Indeed,
quite a number of doctors of all creeds are attacking the new Birth
Control Society. A London physician has a pamphlet on the subject in
the Press, and the controversy rages fiercely in the neighbourhood of
'birth-control' clinics. Much is likely to be made of the example of
France, where the revolt against the practices advocated is now in full
swing, and strong legal measures have been taken and are in
contemplation. French medical opinion is said to be very pronounced on
the subject, and it has, of course, a great deal of clinical experience
to back it."

On November 8, a second paragraph appeared:

"BIRTH CONTROL

"My remark recently that 'a number of doctors of all creeds are
attacking the new Birth-Control Society' has been challenged by the
hon. secretary of the body in question, who observes that I am
misinformed. I must adhere to my statement, which was a record of
personal observation. Many doctors have spoken to me on the subject,
and their opinions on the ethics of birth control differ widely; but I
can only remember one who did not attack this particular society. The
secretary suggests that I am confusing what his society advocates with
something else. As a matter of fact, the whole question of birth
control has been discussed more than once by medical bodies. A doctor
who attended one such discussion shortly after the opening of the
clinic in Holloway told me that, while there was division of opinion on
the general subject, the feeling of the meeting was overwhelming
against the particular teaching given at the clinic, as undesirable and
actively mischievous. The subject is controversial, and I profess to do
no more than record such opinions as are current."

On November 17 the _Sussex Daily News_ published the following letter:

"CONSTRUCTIVE BIRTH CONTROL

"Sir,--Your recent paragraph of 'opinions' about the Mothers' Clinic
and the Society for Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress is
not only extremely unrepresentative, but grossly misleading. Your
writer says that he can only remember one doctor who did not attack
this particular society. This implies that the medical profession is
against it, which is absolutely untrue, as is quite evident from the
fact that we have three of the most distinguished medical men in Great
Britain on our list of Vice-Presidents; four others, also very
distinguished, on our Research Committee; and that Dr. E.B. Turner, in
a Press interview after the recent Church Congress, singled out
Constructive Birth Control as the only 'Control' which was not
mischievous.

"_That there may be medical men who do not approve of birth control is
natural, when one remembers that a doctor has to make his living, and
can do so more easily when women are ailing with incessant pregnancies
than when they maintain themselves in good health by only having
children when fitted to do so. Opinions of medicals, therefore, must be
sifted. The best doctors are with us; the self-seeking and the biassed
may be against us_.

"Details about the society, including the manifesto signed by a series
of the most distinguished persons, can be obtained on application to
the Honorary Secretary, at ... London, N.19.--Yours, etc.

"MARIE C. STOPES,
"President Society for Constructive and Racial Progress."

The italics are mine, and they draw attention to a disgraceful statement concerning the medical profession. As the reader is aware, certain members of our profession approve of artificial birth control. What, I ask, would be the opinion of the general public, and of my friends, if I were so distraught as to suggest that these men approved of birth control because they had a financial interest in the sale of contraceptives? That suggestion would be as reckless and as wicked as the statement made by Dr. Marie C. Stopes. In the _British Medical Journal_ of November 26 I quoted, without comment, the above italicised paragraph as her opinion of the medical profession, and on December 10 the following reply from the lady appeared:

"Your two correspondents, Dr. Halliday Sutherland and Dr. Binnie
Dunlop, by quoting paragraphs without their full context, appear to
lend support to views which by implication are, to some extent,
detrimental to my own. This method of controversy has never appealed to
me, but in the interests of the society with which I am associated, I
must be allowed to answer the implications. The paragraph quoted by Dr.
Sutherland is not, as would appear from his letter, a simple opinion of
mine on the medical profession, but was written in reply to a rather
scurrilous paragraph so worded as to lead the public to believe that
the medical profession as a whole was against the Society for
Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress. My answer, which
appeared not only in the papers quoted but in others, contained the
following statement: 'We have three of the most distinguished medical
men in Great Britain on our list of Vice-Presidents; four others, also
very distinguished, on our Research Committee.' Reading these words
before the paragraph your correspondent quotes, and taking all in
conjunction with an attack implying that the entire medical profession
was against us, it is obvious that the position is rather different
from what readers of Dr. Sutherland's letter in your issue of November
26 might suppose."

It will be noted that Dr. Stopes does not withdraw but attempts to justify her scandalous suggestion by stating, firstly, that the full context of her letter was not quoted by me, and secondly, that her original letter was written "in reply to a rather scurrilous paragraph."

As I have now quoted in full her original letter, excepting the address of her society, and the two paragraphs from the _Sussex Daily News_, my readers may form their own judgment on the following points: Is it possible to maintain that the whole context of her original letter puts a different complexion on her remarks concerning the medical profession? Can either of the paragraphs from the _Sussex Daily News_ be truthfully described as "rather scurrilous," or are they fair comment on a matter of public interest? Moreover, even if a daily paper _had_ published a misleading paragraph about this society, surely that is not a valid reason why its President should make a malignant attack, not on journalists, but on the medical profession?