Femina, A Work for Every Woman

by John A. Miller

If the proposition is generally accepted, that abortions are justifiable as a therapeutical expedient, you open the door to the criminally inclined. Wily women will impose upon inexperienced practitioners by feigning physical suffering as a result of pregnancy, for the purpose of getting rid of their fetuses. There is a certain amount of hardship and discomfort associated with the average pregnancy for a part of the period at least, but this should be suffered with a mother’s fortitude.

The testimony of the early canons of the Catholic Church is very decisive on the crime of abortion, namely, “that the destruction of the fetus in the womb of its parent, at any period from the first moment of conception, is a crime equal in turpitude to murder.”

In Protestant countries abortions are on the increase, and in America it is one of the crying crimes of society, which has so thoroughly tainted and defiled the moral sense of American communities, that it has become next to impossible to get a jury of twelve men who will agree on a verdict to punish this dastardly foul crime of murder, and the abortionist is thus encouraged in his iniquitous vocation.

Professor J. Taber Johnson, of Maryland, stated in his annual oration before the State Medical Society: “The difficulty of conviction for producing abortion is shown in the statement of the Attorney-General of Massachusetts, that of thirty-two arrests and trials of abortionists in that State, in a period of eight years, not a single conviction resulted; and this fact is equally true of other States.” This is indeed a sad commentary on the jury system, which often degenerates into a farce or travesty on justice.

The practice of abortion is on the increase. This is not due to a single cause, but to a number, operating separately or co-operating jointly to the same end. Boarding-house or hotel life exercises a pernicious influence on the habits and morals of women. They sit all day in their apartments with indifferent occupations, or walk the streets between meal hours, without the inspiring thoughts which a cozy home alone can inspire. The maternal instinct languishes or dies completely out, and if women become pregnant while transiently domiciled, they scruple not against committing this great crime, because their surroundings and accommodations may not be suitable for the changed relations which motherhood brings about. If these people had their own little homes, were they ever so humble, their minds would run in different grooves, their lives would be much happier and offspring longingly desired, to fill the nooks in the little household.

Want of domestic training in childhood lays the foundation for this crime. The American girl is trained with a view to display so-called refined accomplishments. This is done by totally ignoring domestic duties; these are to be shunned as menial and degrading; and when girls grow into womanhood and are married, they naturally look upon the ordinary household duties as drudgery, and quite unbecoming a woman of their attainments. There is nothing in their bosoms to arouse a pride in their homes; quite the reverse; that principle has never been inculcated in their youth, so that it is quite natural, that they hie to a boarding-house; here they patronize the abortionist, or acquire proficiency in that art themselves, from lack of nobler occupation.

Changed relations of the sexes destroy the maternal instinct. A man in a man’s place, and a woman in the sphere for which God and nature intended her, is for the best interests of society. There is useful and profitable work for everyone, but each should labor in his or her respective field of natural adaptability, in which there is plenty to do. There is, in the very nature of things, never anything gained by a woman doing a man’s work, because there are always plenty of men around to do that, but while a woman is doing a man’s work, she is necessarily neglecting a woman’s, which it is physically impossible for any man to do for her. There is, consequently, an irretrievable loss to society from misapplied labor. When the great Napoleon was asked by Madam de Stael whom he considered the greatest woman in France, his curt reply was, “She who bore the largest number of children.” This is a tribute to motherhood, which no one can ridicule, for whom should we honor and respect more than the faithful, loving mother, who makes her life subservient to that of her children? There is no comparison between the self-denial of parental devotion and the devotee to amusements and fashion, or the slothful wife, who imposes sterility upon herself for the sake of pandering to depraved appetites and frivolous pleasures.

Depraved associates pave the way to feticide. Some married women are so brazen and callous, that they have no delicacy in narrating their exploits of child murder with a triumphant air, whenever their acquaintances are patient and foolish enough to listen to them. These gadding persons often contaminate the minds of newly-married women, who had never for a moment entertained the thought of such an awful crime, and who would have made happy and contented mothers, were it not for the seeds of discontent and crime which were sown in their early matrimonial career. I have known mothers who had lost the delicate maternal instincts, without which a mother becomes a monster, advise their daughters and encourage them in the perpetration of this crime.

Women of this type should be avoided like the dreaded mancanilla tree, for they poison the body and soul of pure, virtuous women, with whom they come in close contact; they should be shunned by the young housewife like a pestilence, because their hands are scarlet with the blood of their own children.