Public Law and Private Decisions: Birth Control in Connecticut from 1923 to 1965

Thesis advisor: Cynthia L. LyerlyThe forty year fight to reform the 1879 Comstock statute that prohibited the use of birth control in Connecticut began in 1923. When the 1879 measure was originally enacted, it was in response to the bustling market for pornography and reflected that part of the Victorian moral reform movement which classified all things that referenced sex as obscene. Throughout the lengthy struggle, several court cases were pursued and numerous bills were introduced in the state legislature to various degrees of support. Every decade had a different set of arguments for and against the legalization of birth control, spanning from economic and social to medical and moral. The law was ruled unconstitutional by the United States Supreme Court in 1965 based on the burgeoning right to privacy.Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2007.Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences.Discipline: History.Discipline: College Honors Program