Elizabeth “Elmina” Drake was born in December 1827 to Quaker parents in LaGrange, New York, near Poughkeepsie. The Drake home was a haven for abolitionists, women’s rights activists, and other radicals. By 14 she was making notes about parts of the Bible that she found ridiculous. She scribbled “infidel” (atheist) sayings on the eggs the family packed to sell.
In her 20s, she described herself as an atheist in a free thought paper when few women admitted to being atheists. After placing a personal ad in a health journal, she received a reply from Isaac Slenker, a mill owner from Pennsylvania. They married in a Quaker ceremony.
They had two children, one of whom died at age four. They moved to the small village of Snowville, Virginia, where Isaac Slenker operated the woolen mill and they lived in a weather-beaten unpainted cottage in the mountains. Elmina Slenker published novels with atheistic themes.
She came to believe in a philosophy called “sexual temperance” or Alphaism, which viewed alcohol as the enemy of women and family, and the cause of violence and disease. The remedy, she believed, was total abstinence from alcohol and non-procreative sex. This, she felt, would liberate women.
In interest of science, Elmina Slenker circulated sex leaflets
In the late 1870s, a modified version of Alphaism took off: Dianaism.
Dianaites believed sex should be pleasurable to both partners, but instead of abstinence, they advocated a birth control technique called male continence. In 1880, New York sociologist Henry Parkhurst published the book “Diana,” quoting heavily from Elmina Slenker. His publishers sent her the book, and Parkhurst and Slenker became pen pals.
While writing “Diana,” Parkhurst had gathered first-person sexual letters, or “leaflets,” from all over the country that described sexual scenarios or posed frank questions. Many seemed to be fantasy. In the interest of science, Elmina Slenker began circulating the leaflets to interested people, so they could learn more about sex, similar to a modern-day message board.
Elmina Slenker charged with violating Comstock law
On April 28, 1887, she was in her house writing an article on charity when three men came to the door: Robert McAfee, general agent for the Western Society for the Suppression of Vice; Woodstock Post Office Inspector W. H. Barclay; and a U.S. marshal. The marshal said he had a warrant for her arrest. Elmina Slenker was a monogamous grandmother, 59 years old, with short hair and a cleft palate.
She was charged with violating the Comstock law for mailing two leaflets. A free thought journal reported that her arrest was due to a railroad accident in Indiana. A mail pouch delivered by crane was struck and one of her packages burst open. The postmaster noticed the contents, read the leaflets and sent the mail to Washington to be seized,
Anthony Comstock used decoy technique to get evidence
Anthony Comstock, special agent for the U.S. Post Office and for whom the Comstock Act was named, instructed McAfee and Barclay to decoy her to get leaflets. McAfee rented a postal drawer in St. Louis and under a false name requested leaflets, which she sent. She sent Barclay a story in response to a separate decoy letter. This story was called “The Girl & the Dog” and was an anonymous account of a man who claimed to have observed a woman having sex with a dog.
Her indictment charged her with mailing leaflets to McAfee and the dog letter to Barclay. Even though the indicted letters came in sealed envelopes, an 1876 revision of the Comstock law allowed letters to be seized.
After her arrest The New York Times reported that she was known throughout the country “through her pernicious writings.” She was held on $2,000 bail; her husband refused to post it.
Held at Wytheville Jail, 30 miles from her home, she received 800 letters of support while in jail. Liberals helped raise money for a lawyer: New York free speech lawyer Edward W. Chamberlain.
Jury finds Elmina Slenker guilty, but judge lets her go free
The trial opened on Monday, October 31, 1887, in Abingdon, a conservative town, before a judge and 12 jurymen. Barclay and McAfee read portions of the letters aloud, shocking to the jury.
Chamberlain and Elmina Slenker’s other lawyer argued that under a Supreme Court case, Ex parte Jackson, sealed letters could not be seized without a warrant. Slenker said she knew it was illegal to mail the leaflets, did not write any of them, never sold them for a profit, never used them indiscriminately, and considered them private.
The judge instructed the jury to use prevailing obscenity standard, the Hicklin standard, to decide whether the material was obscene: Was there an intent to corrupt? The jury found her guilty in 10 minutes.
Chamberlain made a motion to arrest judgement, arguing that the indictment had not alleged that Elmina Slenker had known the mailed leaflets were obscene. The judge sustained Chamberlain’s motion. On November 4, 1887, Slenker was free.
Her trial made her more vocal in her opposition to the Comstock law. “Crush [the Comstock clan] so utterly,” she wrote, “that they shall never again dare arrest a Liberal and Reformer in the name of obscenity.” She continued to contribute to atheist, health and free speech magazines. She died at age 80.
Amy Sohn is the award-winning author of The Man Who Hated Women: Sex, Censorship, & Civil Liberties in the Gilded Age.