Moses Harman
Encyclopedia
Moses Harman was an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 schoolteacher and publisher notable for his staunch support for women's rights
Women's rights
Women's rights are entitlements and freedoms claimed for women and girls of all ages in many societies.In some places these rights are institutionalized or supported by law, local custom, and behaviour, whereas in others they may be ignored or suppressed...

. He was prosecuted under the Comstock Law
Comstock Law
The Comstock Act, , enacted March 3, 1873, was a United States federal law which amended the Post Office Act and made it illegal to send any "obscene, lewd, and/or lascivious" materials through the mail, including contraceptive devices and information. In addition to banning contraceptives, this...

 for content published in his anarchist periodical Lucifer the Lightbearer
Lucifer the Lightbearer
Lucifer the Lightbearer was an individualist-anarchist journal published by Moses Harman in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Originally produced by a local branch of the National Liberal League as the Valley Falls Liberal , Harman changed the title after he assumed sole editorship in...

. He was arrested and jailed multiple times for publishing allegedly obscene material. His daughter, Lillian Harman, was also a notable anarchist.

Biography

Harman has been credited as one of the founders of what became the eugenics
Eugenics
Eugenics is the "applied science or the bio-social movement which advocates the use of practices aimed at improving the genetic composition of a population", usually referring to human populations. The origins of the concept of eugenics began with certain interpretations of Mendelian inheritance,...

 movement. "He gave the spur and start to this effort. Through his journals, Lucifer, the Light Bearer, later re-christened The Eugenic Magazine, encouraged by a small circle of earnest men and women, he dug down below the surface endeavoring to bring forth a stronger and better type of men".

He died on January 30, 1910 in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...

.

External links

  • Moses Harman: A Kansas Portrait from the Kansas State Historical Society
  • Moses Harman: The Paradigm of A Male Feminist by Wendy McElroy
    Wendy McElroy
    Wendy McElroy is a Canadian individualist anarchist and individualist feminist. She was a co-founder along with Carl Watner and George H. Smith of The Voluntaryist in 1982.-Sex-positive:...

  • Sex Slavery by Voltairine de Cleyre
    Voltairine de Cleyre
    Voltairine de Cleyre was an American anarchist writer and feminist. She was a prolific writer and speaker, opposing the state, marriage, and the domination of religion in sexuality and women's lives. She began her activist career in the freethought movement...

    , an 1890 essay supporting Harman and attacking the institution of marriage
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