[Statement on the Parents' Exposition]

The American Birth Control League, whose contract for a booth was cancelled by the Parents' Exposition at the Grand Central Palace at the insistence of the Board of Education officials, has retained Arthur Garfield Hays to sue the management, Mrs. Margaret Sanger announced last night. She assailed Catholics as responsible for the ban and asserts that the election of Governor Smith "as a representative of a church whose tyrannical intolerance is far worse than the lack of broad-mindedness which it criticizes in others" would be a national calamity.

"At a time when a Roman Catholic aspirant to the Presidency and the party he leads are stressing the importance of religious tolerance," Mrs. Sanger said, "the arbitrary action of Dr. William J. O'Shea in bullying the a flagrant example of the bigotry and usurpation of power exercised by officeholders born and bred in the Roman Catholic faith.

"This conflict brings into the open the menace of intolerant tyranny in the educational institutions of the United States. If such power is to be given national scope, through a Presidential aspirant, its disastrous effect on the future of American civilization will be incalculable."

Charges Insult by O'Shea

Mrs. Sanger explained that upon learning of the objections of Dr. O'Shea to the Birth Control League's exhibition she wrote to him requesting the appointment of a committee to review it and suggest any improvements.

"Dr. O'Shea not only ignored this request but has chosen to insult us and cast aspersions on our work," Mrs. Sanger added. "When confronted with our organization, which has aroused the Roman Catholic Church in open and disguised warfare, he immediately gave orders to kick the American Birth Control League out of the Grand Central Palace without letting a vestige of it remain."

"Such unwarranted usurpation of power can be made in New York City only because it is supported and backed by religious affiliations which are entrenched in political power."

Declaring that "this is the first time we have been barred from an exposition," Mrs. Sanger added that Protestant and Jewish ministers and many social organizations in New York and throughout the country had praised the work of the birth control movement as "the most vital agency for the improvement of the human race."