Margaret Sanger was born Margaret Louise Higgins on September 14, 1879, in Corning, New York. Margaret was the sixth of 11 children born to Michael Hennessey Higgins and Anne Purcell Higgins. Michael Higgins was an outspoken radical who taught Margaret to stand up for what she believed in and made sure she always spoke her mind. At the age of 50, after 18 pregnancies, 11 live births and seven miscarriages, Anne Higgins died from tuberculosis. Shortly after her mother's death, Margaret decided she would become a nurse and care for pregnant women.
In 1896 Margaret attended Claverack College and the Hudson River Institute, then in 1900 transferred to New York's White Plains Hospital to begin her nursing studies. In 1902, shortly before finishing her nursing program, Margaret married architect William Sanger and they moved to Hastings, a small suburb of New York City. Although she suffered from tuberculosis, Margaret and her husband had three children between 1902 and 1910.
In 1910, the Sanger family moved to New York City. Margaret returned to nursing to help support her family, while William struggled to become a painter. The Sangers became involved with a group of activists and artists in Socialist Party , and took part in strikes led by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). They included the 1912 strike in Lawrence, Massachusetts, and the 1913 strike in Paterson, New Jersey.
In 1912, Sanger gave up her nursing career and began to write a column for the New York Call, entitled, What Every Girl Should Know. The articles dealt with sex education and women's health, two issues Sanger was passionate about. It was during this period that Sanger ran into her first episode of censorship. Her article on venereal disease was suppressed by the paper, which stated that it was vulgar and obscene.
Shortly after, Sanger began to challenge the ruling of the 1873 Federal Comstock Law, which made it a crime to import or distribute any device, medicine, or information designed to prevent conception or induce abortion, or to mention in print the names of sexually transmitted infections.
After separating from her husband in 1914, Sanger, who believed in sexual liberation, began to have affairs with several men, including H.G. Wells. It was about that time that she published her first issue of The Woman Rebel, a magazine for radical feminists who advocated the right to practice birth control. Three issues were banned for promoting the use of contraception, and in August 1914, Sanger was indicted on nine charges of violating the Comstock Law.
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