Congress enacts Comstock Act banning contraception and abortion information from U.S. mail

President Ulysses S. Grant signed the Comstock Act on March 3, 1873, making it a federal crime to mail or import contraceptives, abortifacients, or any written information about preventing conception or causing abortion. Anti-vice crusader Anthony Comstock, who lobbied for the bill while serving as secretary of the YMCA's Committee for the Suppression of Vice, was simultaneously appointed a special U.S. Post Office agent with arrest powers. The Act passed with minimal floor debate in the final hours of Grant's first term, carrying penalties up to five years at hard labor. Twenty-four states enacted similar laws, with twelve criminalizing even speech about contraception or abortion.