WEBVTT - The American Plan 0:00:02.560 --> 0:00:06.520 You're listening to American Shadows, a production of iHeartRadio and 0:00:06.600 --> 0:00:16.880 Grim and Mild from Aaron Mankey. Reverend Sylvester Graham had 0:00:16.960 --> 0:00:21.799 a unique perspective on sexual behavior. A. Graham claimed that 0:00:21.880 --> 0:00:24.599 promiscuity had a lot to do with a person's diet. 0:00:25.239 --> 0:00:27.800 While his belief may seem like a stretch, in the 0:00:27.800 --> 0:00:31.760 mid eighteen hundreds, medicine had barely advanced past bleeding patients 0:00:31.800 --> 0:00:35.680 to remove whatever ailed them. A Graham connected diet and sex. 0:00:35.760 --> 0:00:39.160 While recovering from a long term illness in eighteen twenty six, 0:00:39.720 --> 0:00:43.040 he spent considerable time thinking about a moral behavior and 0:00:43.120 --> 0:00:47.480 its root causes. Although ideals of abstinence before marriage were 0:00:47.600 --> 0:00:50.720 nothing new to his peers, A Graham noticed changes in 0:00:50.720 --> 0:00:54.120 the American diet and in people's opinions about sex, and 0:00:54.360 --> 0:00:57.920 he believed the two were connected. Graham began to preach 0:00:58.080 --> 0:01:01.480 that a diet filled with fats, meats, and refined flour 0:01:01.880 --> 0:01:05.640 took a toll on one's body and soul, that those 0:01:05.680 --> 0:01:08.720 who ate these foods were often prone to many illnesses 0:01:08.720 --> 0:01:12.720 and were generally more unhealthy. He reasoned that the more 0:01:12.880 --> 0:01:17.200 immoral someone was, the more the body suffered. He and 0:01:17.319 --> 0:01:20.680 others thought sex should be used for procreation and nothing 0:01:20.760 --> 0:01:23.920 more so in the eyes of the church. An orgasm 0:01:24.000 --> 0:01:27.920 was required from men during sex, but not women, and 0:01:28.360 --> 0:01:31.640 that was part of the problem. Women were beginning to 0:01:31.680 --> 0:01:35.000 stand up for their own points of view. Graham's over 0:01:35.120 --> 0:01:38.240 zealous preaching incited an angry mob of women to violence 0:01:38.240 --> 0:01:41.640 in eighteen thirty four when he tried lecturing them on chastity, 0:01:41.920 --> 0:01:44.120 a concept they felt they had a fine grip on 0:01:44.160 --> 0:01:47.400 all on their own, thank you very much. Worried that 0:01:47.480 --> 0:01:52.120 sexual activity was rampant and harmful, he even urged married 0:01:52.160 --> 0:01:55.360 couples to cut down on sex. To help curb the urge, 0:01:55.640 --> 0:01:59.160 Graham suggested a diet high end fiber, fruit, vegetables, and 0:01:59.240 --> 0:02:02.760 whole grains. Meat should only be eaten in small proportions 0:02:02.880 --> 0:02:06.640 and no more than twice a day. His statements angered butchers, 0:02:06.680 --> 0:02:10.160 who made their living on americans growing meat consumption. He 0:02:10.240 --> 0:02:14.400 began styling himself as Doctor Graham, and he insisted that 0:02:14.480 --> 0:02:17.960 smoking and drinking should also be avoided. A food should 0:02:17.960 --> 0:02:21.720 be bland, no spices to wake any desires, not even pepper. 0:02:22.280 --> 0:02:26.320 Food shouldn't even be physically warm. The more stimulating the food, 0:02:26.520 --> 0:02:29.880 the higher the sexual appetite. In addition to diet, he 0:02:30.040 --> 0:02:33.960 preached that drinking clean water, getting plenty of sunshine, exercising, 0:02:34.120 --> 0:02:37.800 keeping up personal hygiene, and wearing comfortable clothing also reduced 0:02:37.880 --> 0:02:42.640 carnal cravings. Given the changes in people's diets and women's rights, 0:02:43.040 --> 0:02:46.359 Graham concluded that men could no longer control their urges. 0:02:46.800 --> 0:02:49.919 To save them from sin and ill health, he devised 0:02:49.960 --> 0:02:53.360 a coarse ground, wholewheat flower to promote well being and 0:02:53.560 --> 0:02:59.800 control those urges. Stores began carrying Graham's flower. Devotees wrote 0:02:59.800 --> 0:03:02.920 to Gram, thanking him for curing a wide range of 0:03:02.960 --> 0:03:07.160 physical and mental health issues. Some all male boarding houses 0:03:07.200 --> 0:03:10.760 began enforcing his hygiene and exercise regime and served the 0:03:10.760 --> 0:03:15.040 men crackers made with Graham's flour. They contained no sugar 0:03:15.120 --> 0:03:18.359 or fat and were usually softened by soaking or boiling 0:03:18.440 --> 0:03:21.880 to make them more edible. In eighteen thirty eight, Oberlin 0:03:21.960 --> 0:03:26.160 College incorporated the flour into their meal planning. While Americans 0:03:26.280 --> 0:03:28.800 might have become healthier due to a better diet and 0:03:28.840 --> 0:03:32.800 more exercise, it did little to make people abstain from sex. 0:03:33.440 --> 0:03:36.920 So Graham doubled down on his efforts, which proved too 0:03:37.040 --> 0:03:41.200 much for even his most devoted followers. Graham might have 0:03:41.320 --> 0:03:45.560 faded from the public eye, but his crackers grew in popularity, 0:03:45.920 --> 0:03:50.480 though the formula changed over the years, incorporating refined flour, sugar, 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:55.880 and fats. Today Graham crackers come in varieties like honey 0:03:55.960 --> 0:03:59.760 and cinnamon, flavors that might have the Reverend spinning in 0:03:59.800 --> 0:04:11.440 his grave. I'm Lauren Bogelbaum. Welcome to American Shadows. Sylvester 0:04:11.600 --> 0:04:15.400 Graham was hardly alone in having stringent views of morality. 0:04:16.279 --> 0:04:18.680 Ideas of what is moral and what is not have 0:04:18.920 --> 0:04:22.880 long been debated, especially when it comes to sex. And 0:04:23.160 --> 0:04:26.240 while our history books are full of interesting events, we 0:04:26.400 --> 0:04:29.279 rarely hear about those where sex is at the forefront. 0:04:30.080 --> 0:04:33.159 At the start of World War One, the United States 0:04:33.200 --> 0:04:36.520 had a problem. Aside from a lack of available men 0:04:36.600 --> 0:04:39.200 to fight in the war, forcing the government to implement 0:04:39.200 --> 0:04:42.400 a military draft, a large number of soldiers had a 0:04:42.480 --> 0:04:48.080 reputation for excessive drinking and promiscuity, and while rampant alcohol 0:04:48.160 --> 0:04:52.120 consumption did present an issue in health and combat, it 0:04:52.200 --> 0:04:56.480 was these sexual exploits and notoriety for sexually transmitted infections 0:04:56.640 --> 0:05:01.800 or STIs that concerned the government. STIs became such an 0:05:01.839 --> 0:05:05.760 epidemic among soldiers that military doctors treated more men for 0:05:06.000 --> 0:05:10.440 gonorrhea and syphilis than more commonly transmissible diseases such as 0:05:10.640 --> 0:05:15.919 measles or mumps. In fact, only influenzas surpassed STIs in 0:05:15.960 --> 0:05:20.280 the number of infected soldiers. At first, the American Social 0:05:20.360 --> 0:05:24.520 Hygiene Association tried closing brothels and dance halls where they 0:05:24.560 --> 0:05:30.279 determined that antisocial venereal disease carriers worked, and instead of 0:05:30.360 --> 0:05:34.239 arresting the men visiting the brothels, they arrested the women working. 0:05:35.480 --> 0:05:40.200 Those arrested were tested and treated. Additionally, the association sought 0:05:40.240 --> 0:05:45.440 to rehabilitate a weak minded women. The association began providing 0:05:45.520 --> 0:05:48.039 other forms of recreation for the men, teaming up with 0:05:48.120 --> 0:05:52.120 the YMCA, films like Fit to Fight, attempted to educate 0:05:52.160 --> 0:05:55.680 men on the effects STIs had on their abilities as soldiers, 0:05:56.360 --> 0:06:01.479 but the association's initiative was unsuccessful. In nineteen eighteen, the 0:06:01.560 --> 0:06:05.520 government implemented the Chamberlain Khan Act, better known as the 0:06:05.560 --> 0:06:09.719 American Plan. The law stated that the Secretary of War 0:06:09.920 --> 0:06:13.560 and the Secretary of the Navy were quote authorized and 0:06:13.720 --> 0:06:17.000 directed to adopt measures for the purpose of assisting the 0:06:17.080 --> 0:06:22.920 various States in caring for civilian persons whose detention, isolation, quarantine, 0:06:23.279 --> 0:06:27.039 or commitment to institutions may be found necessary for the 0:06:27.080 --> 0:06:30.040 protection of the military and naval forces of the United 0:06:30.080 --> 0:06:35.800 States against venereal diseases. They reasoned that men were only 0:06:35.839 --> 0:06:38.840 acting on their carnal urges and were hardly able to 0:06:38.880 --> 0:06:43.520 resist loose women. Uninfected men who visited brothels often came 0:06:43.520 --> 0:06:47.960 away with STIs, so to them, probiscuous women were the carriers. 0:06:48.839 --> 0:06:52.320 Soldiers who returned home and spread infections to their unsuspecting 0:06:52.360 --> 0:06:56.800 wives or girlfriends weren't considered the problem. Authorities argued that 0:06:56.880 --> 0:07:01.560 infected men were not carriers. Instead, they blamed women. The 0:07:01.600 --> 0:07:04.760 American Plan gave the government and law enforcement the right 0:07:04.839 --> 0:07:10.120 to arrest, quarantine, test, and treat any woman suspected of 0:07:10.120 --> 0:07:15.080 a moral behavior. No actual proof was needed. The morning 0:07:15.160 --> 0:07:19.080 of October thirty first, nineteen eighteen, started like any other 0:07:19.120 --> 0:07:22.280 for Nina McCall, a seventeen year old woman living in 0:07:22.320 --> 0:07:25.960 the small town of Saint Louis, Michigan. The weather forecast 0:07:26.000 --> 0:07:28.880 called for flurries the following evening, and Nina wanted to 0:07:28.960 --> 0:07:32.240 finish her errands early. She exited the post office in 0:07:32.280 --> 0:07:35.280 the town's business district, just as she had done countless 0:07:35.280 --> 0:07:38.440 times before, and Nina lived a few blocks away in 0:07:38.480 --> 0:07:42.000 an apartment she shared with her mother and brother. As 0:07:42.040 --> 0:07:45.760 she left, her eyes met with Lewis Martin's, the town's 0:07:45.760 --> 0:07:49.960 deputy shaff Nina knew the deputy fairly well. As a 0:07:50.000 --> 0:07:53.000 young teen, she had been friends with Martin's daughter. Before 0:07:53.000 --> 0:07:55.520 she was at the door, Martin ordered her to report 0:07:55.720 --> 0:08:00.600 for inspection without recourse or due process. The doctor forcibly 0:08:00.640 --> 0:08:04.560 stripped and examined Nina. At first, he declared she had gonarrhea, 0:08:04.960 --> 0:08:08.600 then decided it was syphilis. Nina had no say in 0:08:08.640 --> 0:08:12.240 the matter, nor any regarding what happened next. She'd seen 0:08:12.320 --> 0:08:15.360 the placards outside other women's homes, the ones that read 0:08:15.520 --> 0:08:19.320 venereal disease in large red letters. Given that she had 0:08:19.480 --> 0:08:22.920 never had sex, Nina was sure she couldn't possibly have 0:08:23.000 --> 0:08:27.120 an infection and insisted the doctor's findings were incorrect. The 0:08:27.200 --> 0:08:30.480 doctor insulted that she was calling him a liar, physically 0:08:30.520 --> 0:08:34.680 threatened her. Then he treated her with arsenic Afterward, he 0:08:34.840 --> 0:08:37.520 and the deputy forced her to sign a document acknowledging 0:08:37.520 --> 0:08:40.520 his findings, the two men informed her that she would 0:08:40.559 --> 0:08:43.160 have to spend six weeks in a detention center, where 0:08:43.200 --> 0:08:47.000 she would be subjected to more exams and treatments. Six 0:08:47.040 --> 0:08:51.120 weeks turned into three months for Nina and thousands of 0:08:51.120 --> 0:09:01.920 other women. The reign of terror had begun. In nineteen eighteen, 0:09:02.160 --> 0:09:05.440 Nina was one of one thousand and seventy two women 0:09:05.559 --> 0:09:09.520 in Michigan alone who were arrested on suspicion of immoral behavior. 0:09:10.600 --> 0:09:14.559 None were given an explanation for the perceived transgression. If 0:09:14.559 --> 0:09:18.400 the arresting officer suspected a woman of immoral behavior, his 0:09:18.520 --> 0:09:22.719 word was enough. With the American plan in place, law 0:09:22.840 --> 0:09:25.720 enforcement across the country took to the streets in what 0:09:25.920 --> 0:09:29.400 was akin to witch hunts. On February twenty ninth of 0:09:29.480 --> 0:09:33.800 nineteen nineteen, Sacramento police working in the Morality Squad set 0:09:33.840 --> 0:09:37.000 out to cleanse the city of im moral women. At 0:09:37.160 --> 0:09:40.760 nine thirty that morning, they arrested a missus Sodfried. Within 0:09:40.800 --> 0:09:44.520 the hour, they arrested one Lena Rosarine. By noon, that 0:09:44.640 --> 0:09:47.839 arrested six women purely on suspicion. By the end of 0:09:47.840 --> 0:09:50.960 the day, the department had twenty five women in custody. 0:09:51.080 --> 0:09:56.400 The arrests had become commonplace, humiliated and embarrassed. Most women 0:09:56.520 --> 0:09:59.520 fortunate enough to be released after the exams went home 0:09:59.720 --> 0:10:03.440 and stayed quiet about their ordeal. To do otherwise would 0:10:03.559 --> 0:10:07.559 raise eyebrows about their actions, risking shame and further humiliation. 0:10:08.240 --> 0:10:11.920 There were some women, however, who did not go home quietly. 0:10:12.760 --> 0:10:16.480 On that day in February, Margaret Hennessy and her sister 0:10:16.720 --> 0:10:19.520 walked to the meat market in Sacramento, where they planned 0:10:19.520 --> 0:10:22.600 to do some grocery shopping. The two women chatted as 0:10:22.600 --> 0:10:25.320 they made their way down the street. One officer Ryan 0:10:25.440 --> 0:10:29.480 approached them, and the women smiled, expecting to move past him. 0:10:30.160 --> 0:10:34.200 Ryan promptly arrested them. The two explained who they were 0:10:34.280 --> 0:10:37.400 and what they were doing. They offered identification and told 0:10:37.400 --> 0:10:40.360 the officer that if they were arrested, Margaret's six year 0:10:40.400 --> 0:10:43.400 old son, currently at school in a nearby convent, would 0:10:43.440 --> 0:10:47.439 have no one to care for him. Officer Ryan remained unmoved. 0:10:48.080 --> 0:10:51.520 To him, two women walking together unchaperoned by a man 0:10:52.000 --> 0:10:56.160 was proof of immoral behavior. He took both women to 0:10:56.200 --> 0:10:59.360 what the city referred to as the Canary Cottage, a 0:10:59.480 --> 0:11:04.160 hospital for isolating and examining women. A male doctor poked 0:11:04.160 --> 0:11:08.640 and prodded Margaret and her sister. After a lengthy gynecological exam, 0:11:08.840 --> 0:11:12.480 the doctor determined that they were free from disease. They 0:11:12.520 --> 0:11:15.040 were released, though they were still ordered to appear in 0:11:15.080 --> 0:11:18.080 court the next morning. The fact that they were free 0:11:18.080 --> 0:11:22.040 of STIs didn't clear them of the charge of acting immrally. 0:11:22.720 --> 0:11:25.720 Angry over their treatment, Margaret went to the press to 0:11:25.760 --> 0:11:29.720 defend her reputation. There's no record of whether Margaret was 0:11:29.800 --> 0:11:33.480 successful or not. A woman could be taken in for 0:11:33.640 --> 0:11:38.160 anything that raised suspicion. Some were arrested for changing jobs, 0:11:38.400 --> 0:11:42.800 eating alone at a diner, walking alone, laughing, or other 0:11:42.840 --> 0:11:46.680 acts that might appear flirtatious. No one needed proof a 0:11:46.760 --> 0:11:50.319 woman was selling sex for money. If an officer determined 0:11:50.360 --> 0:11:54.000 her behavior was unladylike, he could arrest her on suspicion 0:11:54.000 --> 0:11:58.720 of soliciting. Those determined to be diseased based purely on 0:11:58.760 --> 0:12:02.720 a physical exam were imprisoned. The guards looked down on them, 0:12:02.840 --> 0:12:05.800 often beating them or abdussing them with cold water, or 0:12:05.840 --> 0:12:10.080 throwing them into solitary confinement. When interred, the women were 0:12:10.120 --> 0:12:14.679 subjected to further exams, treatment, consisted of mercury injections and 0:12:14.920 --> 0:12:19.000 oral drugs containing arsenic standard treatments for STIs. At the time, 0:12:19.880 --> 0:12:24.360 some women were even sterilized. The American Plan had plenty 0:12:24.400 --> 0:12:28.720 of political supporters, including New York Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia and 0:12:28.840 --> 0:12:33.880 California's Governor Earl Warren. Attorney General Thomas Watt Gregory took 0:12:33.920 --> 0:12:36.920 the time to write to each state urging them to 0:12:37.040 --> 0:12:40.160 enforce the plan. He assured them that the American Plan 0:12:40.240 --> 0:12:44.600 and the arrests were constitutional. Gregory also personally wrote to 0:12:44.640 --> 0:12:49.120 each US district judge instructing them against interfering with arrests. 0:12:49.520 --> 0:12:53.800 Across the nation, mayors and governors enthusiastically enforced the law. 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:58.040 In Michigan, Nina's life in the base entered detention facility 0:12:58.400 --> 0:13:03.080 was deplorable. She and the others had no privacy. All 0:13:03.160 --> 0:13:07.160 incoming and outgoing mail was opened and read. The facility 0:13:07.240 --> 0:13:10.880 had any letters that mentioned physical or medical treatment destroyed, 0:13:11.520 --> 0:13:22.400 and the facility wasn't alone in its actions. Inmates across 0:13:22.440 --> 0:13:25.800 the nation had to sign statements granting their jailers the 0:13:25.880 --> 0:13:31.120 right to scrutinize mail. Many prohibited the women from seeing visitors, guards, 0:13:31.120 --> 0:13:34.560 threatened women with additional detention or treatments if they refused 0:13:34.640 --> 0:13:38.280 their sexual advances. The mercury and arsenic in the pills 0:13:38.280 --> 0:13:41.360 and injections made Nina ill, and she began to lose 0:13:41.400 --> 0:13:44.640 her hair. She and other women were often kept in 0:13:44.679 --> 0:13:48.320 the state of malnourishment every day. Nina asked to go 0:13:48.440 --> 0:13:52.680 home every day. The answer was no. Until January of 0:13:52.840 --> 0:13:57.200 nineteen nineteen, she was released, but was told case workers 0:13:57.200 --> 0:14:00.240 would watch her for the rest of her life, that 0:14:00.320 --> 0:14:02.160 so much as a smile could send her back to 0:14:02.160 --> 0:14:05.719 the detention center. And Nina accepted a marriage proposal in 0:14:05.760 --> 0:14:09.000 the hopes that being a married woman might keep her safe. 0:14:09.880 --> 0:14:13.680 It did not. The woman assigned to monitor Nina was 0:14:13.880 --> 0:14:17.800 furious to learn of her marriage. Social worker Ida Peck 0:14:18.040 --> 0:14:20.800 paid a visit to Nina's ill mother and pressured her 0:14:20.840 --> 0:14:25.680 for information on Nina's whereabouts. Nina's husband, Claire Rock, saw 0:14:25.720 --> 0:14:30.240 an opportunity with his new wife prostitution. He moved to 0:14:30.400 --> 0:14:33.960 Mount Pleasant and took Nina with him. When his plan 0:14:34.080 --> 0:14:36.160 to sell his wife to other men for sex didn't 0:14:36.160 --> 0:14:40.160 work out, he left her for another woman. Nina did 0:14:40.200 --> 0:14:43.880 her best to disappear in Detroit. She couldn't return home 0:14:43.920 --> 0:14:48.400 without subjecting herself to another investigation from Ida Peck. Given 0:14:48.440 --> 0:14:51.320 her husband's attempt to prostitute her out, a pack would 0:14:51.360 --> 0:14:55.800 undoubtedly send her back to the detention center. Abandoned and broke, 0:14:56.200 --> 0:14:59.600 Nina missed her family. She looked forward to their only 0:14:59.600 --> 0:15:03.840 connect letters. One day, she received a letter from her 0:15:03.840 --> 0:15:08.640 mother that changed everything. A wealthy Christian scientist by the 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:12.320 name of Elizabeth Beverly Barr Givens had visited Nina's mother 0:15:12.520 --> 0:15:16.680 and presented an opportunity. She wanted Nina to help her 0:15:16.720 --> 0:15:20.160 sue the state of Michigan and oppose the American Plan. 0:15:21.200 --> 0:15:24.520 By now, women's stories had begun to creep into the press. 0:15:25.360 --> 0:15:29.280 Letters poured into politicians and judges, demanding to know why 0:15:29.360 --> 0:15:32.480 infected men who behaved the same as women, and often 0:15:32.520 --> 0:15:36.440 far worse, were not held accountable. While sex workers were 0:15:36.520 --> 0:15:39.640 arrested and sent to detention centers for treatment, the men 0:15:39.680 --> 0:15:43.600 who paid for their services were not. Gives hired three 0:15:43.640 --> 0:15:46.800 of the state's most prominent attorneys and invited Nina to 0:15:46.840 --> 0:15:50.360 stay with her while the case and trial unfolded. In 0:15:50.440 --> 0:15:54.239 September of nineteen nineteen, and Nina returned to her hometown. 0:15:54.760 --> 0:15:58.680 On November third, her lawyers filed the suit. While Nina 0:15:58.760 --> 0:16:01.840 and Missus Gives waited for the trial, set for June 0:16:01.840 --> 0:16:05.200 of nineteen twenty, Nina worked odd jobs to support herself 0:16:05.360 --> 0:16:08.880 and helped Gibbons around the house. The weather on June 0:16:08.880 --> 0:16:12.840 first proved to be as stormy as the trial. The jurors, 0:16:12.960 --> 0:16:16.400 all male, listened to Nina and other witnesses relay the 0:16:16.440 --> 0:16:20.640 horrors of her treatment and imprisonment. Nina recounted how she 0:16:20.680 --> 0:16:24.200 had been subjected to repeated exams. Though she insisted that 0:16:24.240 --> 0:16:26.920 she had never been with any man before her husband, 0:16:27.520 --> 0:16:31.160 she testified that the exams were so rough that she bled. Afterwards. 0:16:31.760 --> 0:16:35.640 Quietly and eloquently, she told the court about the humiliation 0:16:35.760 --> 0:16:38.800 she had endured and the punishment she had received. The 0:16:38.880 --> 0:16:41.080 court listened as she told them how she had been 0:16:41.200 --> 0:16:44.600 threatened and hunted, how her life had been ruined, all 0:16:44.680 --> 0:16:47.200 for meeting the deputy's eyes as she left the post 0:16:47.240 --> 0:16:51.040 office that winter day. The defense argued that Nina was 0:16:51.200 --> 0:16:54.560 indeed a loose woman who deserved everything that had happened 0:16:54.560 --> 0:16:58.200 to her. In the end, the jury agreed with the defense, 0:16:58.560 --> 0:17:01.920 and the judge ordered Nina to pay the defendant's legal costs. 0:17:02.680 --> 0:17:05.720 Nina and her attorneys appealed, taking the case to the 0:17:05.840 --> 0:17:09.919 Michigan Supreme Court. In nineteen twenty one, the court ruled 0:17:09.960 --> 0:17:13.800 in Nina's favor. Though she'd won, the judge cautioned that 0:17:13.800 --> 0:17:16.879 her treatment and probation would have been within the States 0:17:16.960 --> 0:17:21.040 rights had there been reasonable suspicion that she was infected. 0:17:21.920 --> 0:17:24.800 The era of the American Plan was a dark time 0:17:24.960 --> 0:17:28.639 for women. Nina and tens of thousands of others like 0:17:28.720 --> 0:17:31.720 her were stripped of their dignity and denied their rights 0:17:31.800 --> 0:17:35.480 from the US Constitution's Fourth Amendment, which prohibits searches and 0:17:35.520 --> 0:17:40.000 seizures without reasonable cause. The government had opened over thirty 0:17:40.040 --> 0:17:43.520 of what they called rehabilitation centers across the nation, in 0:17:43.600 --> 0:17:48.120 many complete with barbed wire and armed guards. However, America 0:17:48.280 --> 0:17:51.719 was hardly the first to implement the arrest, examination, and 0:17:51.760 --> 0:17:56.080 detention of women. The American Plan had been inspired and 0:17:56.119 --> 0:18:06.480 modeled after similar laws in European countries. During World War One, 0:18:07.840 --> 0:18:12.440 Nina's story faded from public memory. She remarried and did 0:18:12.480 --> 0:18:15.040 her best to move on with her life. In nineteen 0:18:15.080 --> 0:18:17.800 fifty seven, she was diagnosed with a brain tumor and 0:18:18.119 --> 0:18:20.320 died at a nursing home at the age of just 0:18:20.440 --> 0:18:24.560 fifty six. While it would seem that Nina's victory paved 0:18:24.560 --> 0:18:27.679 the way to abolish the American Plan, it had the 0:18:27.680 --> 0:18:32.280 opposite effect. The American Social Hygiene Association doubled down on 0:18:32.320 --> 0:18:35.840 their efforts against women who they believed acted immorally and 0:18:35.960 --> 0:18:40.240 were a menace to public health. Even after medical science 0:18:40.240 --> 0:18:44.440 advanced and penicillin became the standard treatment for Gonerha, syphilis 0:18:44.520 --> 0:18:47.920 and other sexually transmitted infections in the early nineteen forties, 0:18:48.520 --> 0:18:51.680 women were still harassed, arrested, and locked up for a 0:18:51.680 --> 0:18:56.119 suspicion of having a venereal disease. The American Plan remained 0:18:56.119 --> 0:19:00.880 in effect and remained enforceable for decades. The last attention 0:19:00.920 --> 0:19:05.000 center used to quarantine women shut down in nineteen fifty three, 0:19:05.040 --> 0:19:09.200 thirty four years after they first opened. Not one woman 0:19:09.240 --> 0:19:14.000 received an apology or compensation. Legislators held firm that they 0:19:14.080 --> 0:19:18.040 hadn't done anything wrong. The American Plan lost steam in 0:19:18.080 --> 0:19:22.200 the fifties and sixties, partly due to lawsuits. The civil 0:19:22.280 --> 0:19:25.000 rights movement and the Women's lib movement made it more 0:19:25.040 --> 0:19:27.560 difficult to round up women off the streets and punish 0:19:27.640 --> 0:19:32.240 them unjustly. Yet even through those movements, the Chamberlain Conact 0:19:32.359 --> 0:19:37.040 remained active. Women marching for civil rights in Birmingham feared 0:19:37.080 --> 0:19:40.840 being subjected to arrests and strip searches in nineteen sixty five, 0:19:41.520 --> 0:19:46.520 and their fears weren't unsubstantiated. That same year, eighteen year 0:19:46.520 --> 0:19:50.040 old writer Andrea Dwarkin was arrested outside the United Nations 0:19:50.080 --> 0:19:53.560 Building in New York. A. Dwarkan was protesting the Vietnam 0:19:53.600 --> 0:19:56.520 War when she was arrested. Police sent her to the 0:19:56.520 --> 0:20:00.760 New York Women's House of Detention, known for housing fist women, 0:20:01.560 --> 0:20:04.679 and Dwarkan was subjected to a strip search, followed by 0:20:04.680 --> 0:20:08.400 a gynecological exam from two male doctors so violent that 0:20:08.440 --> 0:20:12.160 she bled for days afterward. Not one to stay quiet 0:20:12.320 --> 0:20:15.840 or take abuse, Dworkin wrote to the Commissioner of Corrections 0:20:16.560 --> 0:20:19.720 she had been arrested for protesting, yet should been forcibly 0:20:19.720 --> 0:20:24.520 examined under the Family Plan Act. After her release, Dwarkin 0:20:24.640 --> 0:20:28.080 testified about her treatment and assault at the facility before 0:20:28.119 --> 0:20:32.320 a grand jury. Unfortunately, the court refused to make an indictment. 0:20:32.800 --> 0:20:36.880 The trial made both national and international news. Drkan's case 0:20:37.000 --> 0:20:41.320 caused outrage in San Francisco, a former sex worker and 0:20:41.440 --> 0:20:45.520 activist banded with an ACLU lawyer to challenge how arrests 0:20:45.560 --> 0:20:49.520 were made in California. The Court of Appeals ruled that 0:20:49.640 --> 0:20:53.639 Oakland police officers would have to quarantine men during prostitution 0:20:53.760 --> 0:21:00.760 arrests too. Instead, prostitution arrests declined sharply. By the nine seventies, 0:21:00.920 --> 0:21:04.600 the Chamberlain con Act, also known as the American Plan, 0:21:05.280 --> 0:21:08.800 had lost many of its supporters, and the government passed 0:21:08.800 --> 0:21:13.400 amendments redirecting the law away from sex workers, real or imagined, 0:21:13.760 --> 0:21:20.200 and towards education and vaccination. However, the law remains active 0:21:20.480 --> 0:21:24.320 to this day. There's more to this story. Stick around 0:21:24.359 --> 0:21:26.720 after this brief sponsor break to hear all about it. 0:21:34.600 --> 0:21:39.040 Advice on birth control has been around for millennia. In 0:21:39.080 --> 0:21:43.120 the first century CE, philosopher Pliny the Elder advised men 0:21:43.160 --> 0:21:46.600 to pull out before climax and in a time when 0:21:46.640 --> 0:21:50.760 we have more reliable methods of preventing pregnancy. Its advice 0:21:50.840 --> 0:21:55.400 some groups still give. Reliable birth control is relatively new, 0:21:55.480 --> 0:22:00.240 but when you consider human evolution, but practices ranging from 0:22:00.280 --> 0:22:06.440 abstinence to more unorthodox methods have always been discussed. Egyptian 0:22:06.480 --> 0:22:10.679 women around fifteen hundred BCE mixed a thick paste of honey, 0:22:10.840 --> 0:22:16.080 sodium carbonate and crocodile dung as a spermicide, and while 0:22:16.080 --> 0:22:19.680 crocodile dung may have actually increased their chances of pregnancy 0:22:19.880 --> 0:22:24.760 by altering their pH levels, other solutions directly impacted women's 0:22:24.920 --> 0:22:29.640 lives or health. Some rather bizarre methods may have actually 0:22:29.640 --> 0:22:33.359 worked to some degree. Acacia dum, for instance, was later 0:22:33.400 --> 0:22:37.760 found to have some spermicidal properties. Fast forward to eighteen 0:22:37.840 --> 0:22:41.200 thirty nine, when Charles Goodyear discovered a way of treating rubber, 0:22:41.480 --> 0:22:44.639 which led to the first rubber condom in eighteen fifty five. 0:22:45.760 --> 0:22:48.639 Given their size and the need for a custom fitting, 0:22:49.119 --> 0:22:53.199 rubber condoms weren't exactly popular, especially in the United States, 0:22:53.800 --> 0:22:57.719 and while preventing pregnancy has long been part of human history, 0:22:58.080 --> 0:23:01.280 there have also been those who believed that discussing sex, 0:23:01.600 --> 0:23:06.440 much less birth control, was a serious morality issue. Anthony 0:23:06.480 --> 0:23:09.680 Comstock made it his mission to do what he considered 0:23:09.680 --> 0:23:13.480 to uphold Christian morality when he spearheaded the Comstock Act 0:23:13.560 --> 0:23:18.480 in eighteen seventy three, which censored everyone, including doctors, from 0:23:18.520 --> 0:23:23.040 discussing birth control a Margaret Sanger, a nurse and activist, 0:23:23.280 --> 0:23:26.600 defied the Act and began offering advice on birth control 0:23:26.640 --> 0:23:29.800 in the twentieth century. Her pamphlets quickly landed her and 0:23:29.920 --> 0:23:34.639 arrest and indictment for breaching obscenity laws. For a while, 0:23:34.840 --> 0:23:38.240 Sanger fled the country to avoid trial, eventually returning in 0:23:38.359 --> 0:23:42.320 nineteen sixteen, she opened a family planning clinic, the first 0:23:42.320 --> 0:23:45.040 of its kind, though officials shut it down in less 0:23:45.040 --> 0:23:49.920 than two weeks. Undeterred, Sanger formed the Birth Control League, 0:23:50.280 --> 0:23:54.680 which would later be rebranded the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. 0:23:54.880 --> 0:23:58.800 Sanger's work led her to biologist Gregory Goodwin Pinkis. In 0:23:58.920 --> 0:24:02.400 nineteen fifty a. Pincus had recently lost his job at 0:24:02.400 --> 0:24:05.560 Harvard A. Sanger approached him with a job offer to 0:24:05.600 --> 0:24:09.240 help her create a pill women could take to prevent pregnancy. 0:24:09.800 --> 0:24:13.560 A thirty states still enforced anti birth control laws, so 0:24:13.600 --> 0:24:17.840 the proposition was controversial, if not risky. For Sanger, the 0:24:17.960 --> 0:24:21.199 partnership was a means to give women some control in 0:24:21.280 --> 0:24:25.720 family planning, an autonomy over their bodies. She also did 0:24:26.000 --> 0:24:29.520 at least partially align herself with at least part of 0:24:29.560 --> 0:24:35.119 the eugenics movement, specifically limiting reproduction in people with mental 0:24:35.160 --> 0:24:39.520 and physical disabilities or those living in poverty. A wealthy 0:24:39.560 --> 0:24:43.440 philanthropist by the name of Catherine Dexter McCormick funded the project. 0:24:44.040 --> 0:24:47.879 Sanger and Pinks teamed up with obstetrician John Rock. The 0:24:47.960 --> 0:24:51.640 three tested the effects of progesterone on rabbits and rats. 0:24:52.119 --> 0:24:55.479 Pincus took it a step further, though, He suggested they 0:24:55.520 --> 0:24:59.439 take their discovery and experiment to Puerto Rico, where laws 0:24:59.440 --> 0:25:03.119 were a bit more relax. Puerto Rico had authorized family 0:25:03.119 --> 0:25:07.640 planning clinics and had encouraged contraception practices since nineteen thirty seven, 0:25:08.240 --> 0:25:12.240 probably due to the aforementioned eugenics. The government there took 0:25:12.240 --> 0:25:15.440 the practice to extremes, often pressuring women to have a 0:25:15.560 --> 0:25:19.160 hysterectomy after the birth of their second child. The governor 0:25:19.200 --> 0:25:22.800 believed that the poor were ignorant and couldn't control themselves. 0:25:23.400 --> 0:25:26.320 A Pincus, Rock, and Sanger set up a clinical trial 0:25:26.840 --> 0:25:30.560 recruiting women from a local medical university in nineteen fifty five. 0:25:31.160 --> 0:25:34.320 Half the women quickly dropped out, fearing potential side effects. 0:25:35.080 --> 0:25:38.600 Pincus decided on a different approach this time, recruiting poor 0:25:38.640 --> 0:25:43.000 women who were desperate to prevent pregnancy wore hysterectomies. The 0:25:43.080 --> 0:25:46.000 group set up a lab in the Rio Piethos neighborhood 0:25:46.080 --> 0:25:49.800 in San Juan. Two hundred and sixty five women signed 0:25:49.880 --> 0:25:53.920 up for the trial. None were given safety information regarding 0:25:53.920 --> 0:25:57.680 potential side effects such as blood clots, depression, or nausea. 0:25:57.800 --> 0:26:02.080 A pincus focused on efficiency over potential side effects. Three 0:26:02.119 --> 0:26:06.240 women died during the trial. No autopsies were performed, so 0:26:06.280 --> 0:26:09.639 it's unclear whether the fatalities were related to the pill. 0:26:10.359 --> 0:26:14.000 The FDA approved the pill for contraception prevention on May 0:26:14.080 --> 0:26:18.400 ninth of nineteen sixty The pill remained controversial, but by 0:26:18.480 --> 0:26:22.080 nineteen sixty five it became the most widely used form 0:26:22.119 --> 0:26:26.199 of birth control, putting women in control of their fertility. Today, 0:26:26.359 --> 0:26:30.639 the safer reformulations lessen the side effects while offering ninety 0:26:30.680 --> 0:26:35.680 nine percent efficiency. However, in twenty twenty two, many political 0:26:35.760 --> 0:26:39.480 leaders voted against a rule to prevent states from banning 0:26:39.560 --> 0:26:48.080 a woman's right to birth control. American Shadows as hosted 0:26:48.080 --> 0:26:51.960 by Lauren Vogelbaum. This episode was written by Michelle Muto 0:26:52.480 --> 0:26:55.919 researched by Ali Steed and produced by Miranda Hawkins and 0:26:55.960 --> 0:27:00.399 Trevor Young, with executive producers Aaron Mankey, Alex BOMs, and 0:27:00.400 --> 0:27:04.280 Matt Frederick. To learn more about the show, visit grimanmil 0:27:04.400 --> 0:27:08.760 dot com. From more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, 0:27:09.000 --> 0:27:12.160 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.