On July 29, 1911, an Austrian immigrant mother was arrested for the infanticide of her three-week-old baby. After Mary Stastch had given birth to her baby at the county hospital, the single mom wandered around the city of Chicago for a few days, searching for work. As an immigrant woman, it was hard for Mary to find work in the city. She did not end up finding a job, leaving her exhausted and in poverty. One afternoon, she decided to kill her newborn baby as she found that she was not able to support it due to her situation, claiming that the baby “accidently dropped” from her arms.
As an immigrant woman, it was extremely difficult for Mary Stastch to be able to find a source of income for food and shelter for her and her baby. Especially as a single mother, Mary did not have the social status to easily find a job in Chicago. Back in the 1900s, women were expected to be working in the house, sticking with their domestic sphere—this caused employers to become reluctant in hiring Mary. In Mary’s case, she was in a situation where finding a source of income was nearly impossible. Her action of killing her newborn baby seems to be justified in her situation as there seems to literally be no hope in finding the necessities to live and keep her baby. Her social status did not allow her to obtain the resource she needed to take care of the baby, which justifies her decision to commit infanticide. The justification leads to the idea of the extent of hopelessness that is needed in order to justify the killing of one’s baby. As observed by Mary’s situation, one needs to be completely out of options to be considered justified in killing one’s baby.
Motherhood Complexities 