Without taking a political stand, this issued served to remind our society of the current world environment situation and the need for planning to have a better America and a better world. Until rather recently, most cultures have stressed increasing, rather than reducing, procreation. In the early 19th century, British economist Thomas Malthus was the first to warn that the population of the world was increasing at a faster rate than its means of support. Nineteenth-century reformers, who advocated birth control as a means of controlling population growth, met bitter opposition both from churches and from physicians.