Margaret Sanger The Children's Era Summary

Trying to prevent neglected children and back-alley abortions, Margaret Sanger gave the moving speech, “The Children’s Era,” in 1925 to spread information on the benefits and need for birth control and women's rights. Margaret Sanger--activist, educator, writer, and nurse--opened the first birth control clinic in the United States and established organizations that evolved into the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. During most of the 1900’s, birth control and abortions were illegal in the United States, causing women to give birth unwillingly to a child they must be fully responsible for. This caused illness and possible death for women attempting self-induced abortion. Sanger uses literary devices such as repetition and analogies

You cannot have a garden, if you let weeds overrun it.
So, if we want to make this world a garden for children, we must first of all learn the lesson of the gardener (Sanger n.pg.).
By saying that the seeds need proper soil to grow is to a child, having a welcoming home. Sanger is encouraging the use of contraceptives, because without it, a mother who is unwilling to have a child, cannot raise them like they need to be raised. A gardener must protect their crops from weeds, as a mother must protect their child from harm. Her overall message in this analogy is that before having children, you must make sure that you are ready to be a parent with responsibilities. The use of an analogy helps to better explain this, because a garden and a child are similar in these ways, and by comparing them, more people can understand. Another example is when Sanger explains the actions adults are taking;
We have only been a sort of silly reception committee, a reception committee at the Grand Central Station of life. Trainload after trainload of children are coming in, day and night -- nameless refugees arriving out of the Nowhere into the Here. Trainload after trainload -- many unwelcome, unwanted, unprepared for, unknown, without