[Sidenote: Dr. Morrow leader in America.]
In America the movement for sex-education began with the organization
of the American Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis on February
9, 1905, under the leadership of Dr. Prince A. Morrow. It is true that
before this time there were various local and sporadic attempts at
instruction concerning sexual processes, but such teaching was chiefly
personal and there was no concerted movement looking towards making
sex-instruction an integral part of general education. In 1892,
thirteen years before the organization of the Society of Sanitary and
Moral Prophylaxis, a group of members of the National Education
Association considered briefly the importance of instructing young
people. However, this meeting was of ephemeral significance and had no
genetic relation to the present-day movement. Other early interest in
sex-instruction is indicated in Professor Earl Barnes's bibliography
which was published in his "Studies in Education," Vol. I, p. 301,
1897.
The educational activities, especially the publications of the American
Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis, soon attracted the serious
attention of numerous physicians, ministers, and educators in various
parts of the United States; and about twenty other societies for study
and improvement of the sex problems were organized within a few years
after the original society.
[Sidenote: Original aim for sanitary ends.]
The sex-education movement both in Europe and America had its origin as
an attempt to check the spread of the venereal or social diseases. The
idea that education should work for sexual morality for its own sake
and not simply for protection against venereal diseases has only
recently begun to appear in the literature of sex-education, and so far
it seems to have made only a limited impression on many of those who
have been active in the prophylactic campaign against social disease.
In fact, the tardy recognition of the moral aim of sex-education makes
it seem probable that very little interest would have been aroused in
the movement if it had been organized on purely ethical grounds and
without any reference to the sanitary problems of social diseases. To
one who looks at sexual morality as a question of right conduct which
brings its own rewards, it is a shock to find so many thinking people
who accept calmly the traditional views of the relation of the sexes
and seem to take no interest in the immorality of men except as it is
likely to lead to venereal disease or to illegitimacy which demands
forced marriage or monetary payments. The truth is that the civilized
world at large is very far from a working code of sexual morals which
will be practiced because of promised rewards rather than because of
probable punishments. It is natural, then, that the sex-education
movement should have started with a proclamation of physical
punishments for immorality rather than an offer of ethical and
psychical rewards for morality.
[Sidenote: Both sanitary and moral.]
However, the fact that sex-education, under the name of "sex-hygiene,"
was at first a sanitary propagandism need not interfere with the larger
development of sex-education. It now seems probable that before many
years pass we shall learn how to make a satisfactory combination of
both the sanitary and moral sides of sex-education, and so it is best
that the educational movement started on the foundation of the
undisputed facts of sanitary science which have made a powerful
impression on the people who do and who do not recognize a code of
sexual morals.
[Sidenote: Medical interest.]
The deep interest of the medical profession is directly responsible for
the close association between the beginning of the sex-education
movement and the diseases of immorality. At the organization meeting of
the American Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis, Dr. Prince
Morrow in the opening paragraph of his address said: "We have met for
the purpose of discussing the wisdom and the expediency of forming a
society of sanitary and moral prophylaxis. The object is to organize a
social defense against a class of diseases which are most injurious to
the highest interests of human society." Thus, the American Society of
Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis started as an avowed enemy of the social
diseases and so it has continued to the present. The very name of its
official journal, _Social Diseases_,[19] indicated the central idea of
the Society. Likewise, most of the local American societies for
sex-hygiene have names including such phrases as "social hygiene,"
"prevention of social diseases," "sanitary prophylaxis"; and only one,
the Massachusetts Society for Sex Education, has a name which does not
directly suggest the medical problems of sex.
[Sidenote: In Europe.]
In Europe, the sex-instruction movement has been concerned chiefly with
spreading information concerning the social diseases. In 1902 an
international congress for consideration of the venereal diseases was
held in Brussels, and this congress recommended that in all countries
there should be organized sanitary, social, moral, and legal societies
for the prophylaxis of these diseases. As a result of this
recommendation, prophylactic societies were formed in France, Germany,
Italy, Holland, the United States, and other countries. Of these, the
German society for the prevention of venereal disease became the
strongest, with over five thousand members and twenty branch
societies.
[Sidenote: National societies.]
The fact that the American Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis
was organized by a group of people in New York City tended from the
beginning to make it a local society. While for several years it took
the lead in sex-hygiene and enrolled members residing in many parts of
the United States, it was never a national organization. In recent
years the word "American" has been omitted from its name, and its work
has been limited to New York City and vicinity.[20] Many independent
state and city societies were organized within a few years after the
original sex-hygiene society in New York. This multiplication of
societies called attention to the need of a national organization, and
in 1910 the various societies were affiliated in the American
Federation for Sex-Hygiene. Dr. Morrow was the leading spirit in the
Federation until his death. In 1913, the Federation and the American
Vigilance Association (a society especially concerned with the social
evil) were united in the American Social Hygiene Association. Its
offices are at 105 West 40th Street, New York City.