Baird appeals to 1200 frosh

“Who belongs in your bedroom? The state?” asked birth control advocate William R. Baird of approximately
1200 freshmen who gave him a standing ovation Sept. 9 in Alumni Auditorium.

Stating that people in Massachusetts are liable for a three-month prison term for violation of the state’s
chastity laws by fornication, Baird emphasized that “What goes on in your bedroom is your own private
morality.”

He indicated that female violators of the law are being punished with unwanted pregnancies due to the
illegality of birth control devices.

“Moralists who want to keep laws on the books say that when birth control devices are. Legalized
women will become prostitutes. There are no birth control laws in some states, are there more
prostitutes there?” queried Baird.

At the Student Council’s invitation, the 35-year-old founder and director of New York’s Parent Aid Society
and Clinic brought his crusade to Northeastern where the co-eds were “third in asking for information on
abortion” among the colleges he had visited.

Baird, who was sentenced to three months in prison by Suffolk Superior Court Judge Donald
Macaulay for giving a Boston University student a contraceptive foam while lecturing at the university
in 1967, asked the audience, “If I do go, for God’s sake, don’t let me go to jail for nothing.”

His sentence was stayed pending his appeal to the Supreme Court.

“This is one helluva fight. I’m up against the Catholic Church, laws that are 100 years old and the apathy of the nation. It’s scarry not knowing whether I’ll be arrested or not,” he continued.

Stating that he was “glad that Northeastern has finally realized the tremendous problem of unwanted
pregnancies.” Baird said that “the highest number of pregnancies is in the first year of college.”

He also stated that according to the President’s Crime Commission over one million abortions are performed
illegally in the United States every year and that over 10,000 women die from these abortions.

Asking the audience “not to let these figures roll off your backs” Baird said that the greatest problem facing
the world today is the present birth rate.

After asking if the present birth control and abortion laws are protecting the people, Baird said that in
addition to the population problem, the laws were also increasing the number of “abandoned children, children born into homes where they are not wanted or loved.”

The former medical director of Emko, a pharmaceutical firm which produces a contraceptive foam, stated
that 1,000 heroin addicted babies were born by addicted prostitutes unable to legally purchase birth control
devices.

“Isn’t it of far more value to let these women have abortions or birth control information?” he asked.
After explaining the primitive and often fatal methods women use to abort themselves, Baird displayed
various birth control devices including chemical and mechanical contraceptives.

Baird who serves as an advisor to New York City Mayor Lindsay and the New York state legislature, closed
by asking “What the hell have you done for your own right to sexual freedom?”

By Mary Gelinas. Appeared in the paper Sept. 19, 1969.