Scientific Temperance Federation Quotes
Drinking mothers lost more than half their babies, sober mothers less than one-fourth
The relationship between pregnant women drinking and miscarriage was known even before medical science understood exactly why.
Scientific Temperance Federation, Poster 1913
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
The relationship of drinking to industrial accident was well known at the beginning of the century. Automobiles had not yet become plentiful enough for people to focus on drunken driving.
Mrs. Roosevelt made issues national by the use of her daily column which was a type of blog with newspapers. Here she focused on a major health problem. At the time, Mrs. Roosevelt saw this as a women’s issue which of course it was. Government spent large sums of money to minimize or prevent death of men in war, but almost nothing on the problem of women’s death in childbirth despite the fact that many more women were killed than men. Unfortunately, while not to the same degree or proportion, the problem is still with us. With our wonderful modern medicine, we have increased the lifespan of most Americans markedly, but there are still many women who receive no prenatal care or counseling with the negative consequence.
If a state or community legally decides that a fetus is a person, there are many situations where there is a conflict of interest between the mother to be and the fetus. A pregnant woman, having a single drink of alcohol, potentially dangers the fetus (called Fetal Alcohol Syndrome). Smoking is clearly hazardous to the health of the fetus (underweight babies and more infant mortality and even more SIDS deaths. A diet to keep a mother thinner may not be nutritious for the fetus, A few states and local government have started prosecuting pregnant women for their personal behavior that might be detrimental to the fetus—often the purpose is to assert the right of the state to regulate the behavior of the pregnant woman so that the state can control abortion.
The Zika, virus, when contracted by a pregnant woman, has a high likelihood of deforming the fetus so that if the fetus is carried to term, the baby will have a very small head with a raft of mental and physical impairments that go with that condition. The consequence of the 2016 Zika outbreak was many more women wishing to have abortions and a great dilemma for man abortion opponents.
The Scientific Temperance Federation was founded in 1906 upon the death of Mary Hunt, head of the Women's Christian Temperance Union's Department of Scientific Temperance Instruction.
