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United States V. Dennett:The Battle For Sex Education In The Early 1900s, Hannah Breda
United States V. Dennett:The Battle For Sex Education In The Early 1900s, Hannah Breda
History Honors Program
The 1873 Comstock Act outlawed the production and distribution of any materials that were deemed to be obscene or capable of arousing adolescents. Mary Ware Dennett, a women's rights activist and pioneer in birth control and sex education, was one of the many who fell victim to this law. Dennett was arrested in 1929 for distributing her sex education pamphlet, The Sex Side of Life, written for her teenage sons after finding the sex education materials produced by the government to be insufficient. This paper argues that Dennett's pamphlet was scrutinized in United States v. Dennett because it …