January 25, 1933

Baroness Keichi Ishimoto, leader of Japan’s feminist movement, lectured on “The Women of Japan.” Her remarks on the home and business lives of women in Japan and on the conditions of workers and feminists were part of group of lectures on aesthetic and social aspects of Japanese life. In the United States since early November, the Baroness was particularly interested in the American birth control clinics. “The importance of birth control for a country like Japan,” she told The New York Times in “perfect English,” “may be perfectly perceived when you consider that Japan is a small country with a population of 65,000,000 and growing at a rate of nearly 1,000,000 a year…. It is my plan to have birth control field clinics introduced on a wide scale in Japan.”

While regretting the suppression in Japan of civil liberties by teh Fascist government, she said that officials’ attitude on the matter was one of “benevolent neutrality.” She hoped that Japan would ultimately work out its economic and political problems, and as to talk of military action, “The Japanese people,” she said, “do not want war with the United States or any other country. They know that the country that starts war will do so to its own destruction.” The New York Times, The Miscellany News