A Margaret Sanger Interview

Legendary newsman Mike Wallace recently died. His death led to the finding of this interview with Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger. The interview is incredibly interesting and worth a thorough viewing. Here is a link to the full interview (set aside about 25 minutes for a full viewing):

http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/288555-1

Several things struck me about the interview.

The first was that Sanger was making the EXACT same arguments that the modern political left is making today - on a host of topics. Overpopulation, the purpose of marriage and of sexual intercourse, the nature of love, divorce, the nature of God and sin – all these issues came up. And Sanger trotted out views that could be parroted word for word by modern liberals. (Wallace challenged these views – but later generations of journalists adopted them.)

The second was the intense anger Sanger displayed when discussing the Roman Catholic Church. Sanger specifically named the hierarchy of her Roman Catholic Church as her biggest enemy. She even snapped at one point: “They’re celibates! They don’t know love, they don’t know marriage, they know nothing about bringing up children or any of the marriage problems of life, and yet they speak to people as if they were God!”

The third was the fact that Sanger dodged many of Wallace’s questions and probes. “I don’t agree” and “I haven’t heard of that” were common phrases out of her mouth. At one point, she adamantly denied she had made a statement that she had made to Wallace’s own reporter.

But the final and most interesting part was right at the end. For Wallace asked about Sanger’s children and grandchildren. For a woman that showed such hostility to children, (she even said that bringing children into the word was a “sin”) she loved her own. And she exhibited obvious love for her eight grandchildren, despite her railing against children.

The interview confirms that Sanger was a ruthless enemy of the Church, and even an eneny of the human race. But even the worst of people retain touches of their humanity. Make no mistake, I believe Sanger to be one of the worst human beings ever to have walked the earth – on the level of Stalin or Hitler. But even the worst enemies of Christianity are human.