DO NOT FAIL
To Re a d and Consider
WHAT IS PRESENTED
IN THIS
LITTLE BOOK.
Words of Warning
TO THOSE
WHO AID AND ABET
IN TIIE
SUPPRESSION OF
FREE SPEECH AN ID
FREE PRESS,
. (Deu.434 &
COMSTOCKISM WITH ITS
IGNorANt tº ENSORSHIP OF THE PREss Exposiºd 1
A FABLE
Or THE
SPIDER AND THE BEES,
WEEIFIED BY
FACTS AND PRESS AND PULPIT COMMENTS
WHICH SHOULD COMIMAND THIL
Serious Attention of CYBI) American Citizęn.
-O-
COMPILIED
BY THE NEW YORK
NATIONAL DEFENSE ASSOCIATION.
--O-
NEW YORKs
1881.
AN INTRODUCTORY WORD.
THIs little Brochure has been hastily prepared to meet
an immediate need of something to awaken all fair-
minded and liberty-loving people to the danger which
menaces the liberty of the Press in a country in which
heretofore it has been supposed to be permanently se-
CUlre.
We have no time to introduce original matter, nor is
this course necessary as we have at hand more articles
and paragraphs which have appeared from time to time
in our journals, periodical literature and occasional pam-
phlets than we can conveniently use. An ingeniously
w£itten Fable from the pen of Dr. E. B. Foote, SE., and
which originally appeared in the HEALTH MonTELY, will
first be introduced, following which will be found facts
and comments sufficient to show that all the wrongs
depicted in the illustrated Fable are actually being in-
flicted under the pretense of suppressing obscene
literature.
PRICE ONE DIME, the profits on the sale of which go
into the Treasury of the NATIONAL DEFENSE Associ-
ATION. We should be pleased to receive orders for from
one to one hundred copies from the friends of the cause
everywhere. Orders and remittances may be sent to
G. L. HENDERSON, No. 141 Eighth Street, New York.
º
[From Dr. Foote's Health Monthly.]
A Fable of the Spider and the Bees.
IN A delightful garden, surrounded with fruit-
bearing trees and filled with gorgeous and fragrant
flowers of endless variety, was a large apiary in-
habited by fat, sleek, busy bees, bent upon filling
their hives with the richest of honey that could be
gathered from the sweet flowers growing in the
garden. These bees it should be understood were
quite in the majority as compared with the other
insects and were consequently the law-givers of the
insect community which inhabited the beautiful
place. One dark night when all the other insects
were stowed away in the leaves of the bushes and
trees taking their nocturnal naps, a venomous
spider bearing on his broad, dark back a growth of
dirty white down, forming for all the world hiero-
glyphics which could be clearly interpreted as the
letters A and C, crept stealthily up to the great
central hive and sought to form an alliance with
these rich and powerful insects. He begged their
permission to spread a large web across the garden
saying that the moths that entered their hives and
devoured their honey came from a species of
4 FABLE OF THE SPIDER AND THE BEES.
moths that had wings, and if he were permitted to
weave his web he would catch all these moth-mil-
lers, and the Hessian-flies that destroyed the wheat,
and all other predatory winged insects. Notwith-
* *
º
- º Łº
º intº
%.
TEIE BEAUTIFUL GARDEN.
standing the lateness of the hour the bees in the
great central hive were buzzing as lively as at
noonday, having under consideration some two or
three hundred important measures for the pretended
protection and welfare of the denizens of the gar-
den. With a moment's pause, however, they were
captured by the stratagem of the spider and gave

THE EXPANSIVE WET3. 5.
their high official assent to his mercenary applica-
tion. When daylight came an expansive web.
fastened to a tree on one side of the gaiden and
attached to a shed on the otler, and extending.
†: #:
º
s º - - - - ſº
Zºº º gift
- ſiſ...}
--
->
- Cºlº
- º #:
24/ º º " . * 1
º^*. ºjº.
º
º
£jºſº Bº
THE EXPANSIVE WEB.
from the very tops of the trees away down to the
ground itself, was ſound to have been ingeniously
spun. It looked as if even the bees could not ſly
through the air without becoming entangled in its
meshes, and some of the influential bees and other
well-fed insects who were popular with the insect




















6 FABLE OF THE SPIDER AND THE BEES.
tribes sought the spider and expostulated with him
for making his web so large and its meshes so fine.
But the spider, lifting his head from a struggling
butterfly that was writhing in his grasp, assured
THE OPULENT INSECT
WHICH WAS LET OUT OF THE WEB.
A complaint was entered against the President of the Society for
the Suppression of Vice for sending through the mails a pam-
phlet which recommended Vaseline for purposes pronounced
criminal by his Society. The pamphlet has been withdrawn, but
no indictment Was found against the guilty party.
them that the large and popular insects which
should become entangled would be liberated, and
that no harm would occur to them, a pledge which
shortly after was shown to be faithfully kept when
an opulent insect which had presided with interest

THE VENOMOUS SPIDER. 7
over the entire work of the spider, and which
through alleged ignorance became entangled there-
in, was speedily relieved. The spider meanwhile
was catching and sucking the blood of some of the
most valuable insects of the garden—those which
Prof. Gray in his botanical essays informs us are
useful in fertilizing the blossoms and in making the
AND HERE IS THAT VENOMOUS SPIDER.
trees and flowers fruitful. Finally the indignant
insects of the garden gathered together at the
great central hive in the apiary—assembled 7o.ood
strong—all hard-working and intelligent insects—
to ask that the web be broken down and that the
garden be enjoyed by all of them. But the wary
spider, with outspread legs and gleaming eyes in
the centre of his great transparent web beheld the
movements of the insects and quickly followed

8 FABLE OF THE SPIDER AND THE BEES.
them. He showed to the wise bees of the central
hive how many of the bee-moths, the Hessian-flies
and other troublesome insects he had caught in
his web and how much he had done to rid the gar-
%2 tº \"\\\\
%/º
%ff
%:// ſº Z. º
§ſº
غ º: -
º
Pºsº |
% ºf
THE PETITIONS TO THE CENTRAL HIVE.
In the winter of 1877-78 a monster petition containing nearly
or quite 70.000 signatures was presented to Congress by Gen. Benj.
F. Butler and Senator Teller for the repeal or modification of the
Comstock laws, but the “Agent” visited the Congressional Com-
mittee, accompanied by the President of the Society for the Sup-
pression of Vice, and the Committee reported adversely.
den of these mischievous creatures. Hearing this,
and ignoring the valuable work of his innocent







THE QUESTION IN COURT. 9
victims, the bees concluded not to disturb the spi-
der and his web. At last a hive of bumble-bees
who were supposed to have the wisdom and justice
of an impartial tribunal were supplicated, and
#|Niñº
THE QUESTION
REFERRED TO THE SUPRISMI, COUIRT.
after the bumble-bees before whom all complicated
grievances were brought examined the whole ques-
tion they said that a web could not be justly spun
across the great free air if it prevented the free-
dom of circulation of the insects through the gar-

2
10 FABLE OF THE SPIDER AND THE BEES.
den. But after examining the matter in all its
bearings with their big eyes and still bigger heads,
they found that the web did not do this, for, said
they, the insects who feel aggrieved can creep
along the fences or on the grounds of the garden,
or they can go outside of it, and that conse-
quently the freedom of the garden was not
in the least degree restrained : *—a decision which
disregarded the fact that the web was indeed
drawn over the ground and fences as well as
across the garden and all around it! The spider
therefore continued to catch all the butterflies with
beautiful wings, harmless white-souled millers and
hard-working insects which had heretofore been
flying from flower to flower and fulfilling their mis-
sion, while the large and powerful bees flew
through and through the web with impunity in col-
lecting the honey with which to fill their hives from
the fragrant and many-colored flowers of the
garden.
#A test case having been carried to the Supreme Conrt of tho
TJ. S. in the Spring of 1878, it was decided th it regulations against
the transportation through the U. S. mails could not be so enforced
as to “interfere in any manner” with the freedom of the press,
because “liberty of circulating is essential to that freedom *-
“Therefore When Such matter is excluded fromil the mails “this
ligh court says its transmission in any other way ca:not be ſor-
bidden by Congress l” That the mail laws can be made to ex-
•c.ude printed matter the circulation of which cannot be “inter-
ſered with in “any manner’” sounds like Supreme nonsense from
£he Supreme Court. But So it decides.
Fatts Which ||||Istrate,
FACTs which abundantly illustrate the truth of
the foregoing Fable can be compressed into a brief
statement of three notable cases relating to popu-
lar physiology, free thought in theology, and radical
expression in sociology. And let us first remind
the reader that in the annual report of the Agent
of the N. Y. Society for the Suppression of Vice,
so called, in 1875, it was said that over thirty phy-
sicians had been arrested for the publication of
works not considered “scient fic,” and in his re-
port for 1878, it is actually proposed to stamp out
all free-thought literature.
A CASE IN THE FIELD OF PHYSIOLOGY.
In 1876, the anniversary of a FREE nation’s birth,
Edward B. Foote, M.D., of 120 Lexington Avenue, New
York, was arrested and subjected to a three day's trial be-
fore the U. S. Court, criminal branch, for having sent
through the U. S. mail a copy of a pamphlet entitled,
“Words in Pearl for the Married ?” With a jury which
did not want to be considered inferior to anybody for
purity and chastity, the Doctor was convicted and sen-
tenced to pay a fine of $3500 The expenses of the trial
altogether amounted to over $5000 ! Had it not been for
the intercession of ex-governors, medical gentlemen of
high position and clergymen, all of whom gave testimony
12 IN THE FIELD OF PHYSIOLOGY.
to Dr. Foote's “excellence of character,” “studious habits,”
“pure life,” “keen intellect,” “honest purpose,” “genial
humanitarianism,” (the quotations indicating the precise
terms used) the Doctor would have undoubtedly been
consigned to a felon's cell! And for what? Simply for
putting in print some twenty questions almost daily asked
of him by honest enquirers after knowledge, and append-
ing the most rational answers thereto—the whole consti-
tuting a little pamphlet of 32 pages, which he was in the
habit of mailing under letter postage and in sealed en-
velope to those asking for such information . One medical
gentleman, a leading professor in one of the medical col-
leges of New York, wrote to Judge Benedict, before whomi
the case was tried, that “Physicians generally agree that
the pamphlet contains only rational answers to questions
usually asked by married men of their medical advisers.”
It was not charged nor was it true that Dr. Foote had cir-
Culated this pamphlet broad-cast in the thoroughfares or in
dther ways forced it upon the attention of unwilling read-
ers. We quote this case as a representative one because
Dr. Foote is widely known as a popularizer and original
writer of physiological literature, his “Medical Common
Sense” having sold to the extent of over 250.ooo copies;
his “Plain Home Talk,” in English and German, to over
15o.oOo.; his “Science in Story,” (which was considered
by one popular clergyman goºd enough for a Sunday-
school library, into which he placed two sets) to nearly or
quite 50.oOo copies ; and various monographs on various
physiological and health subjects to the extent of more
than a million copies. And this was the author, backed by
an intelligent, appreciative constituency in both Europe and
America, who was fined $3500 under the “Comstock laws,”
and at the instance of Comstock, for mailing an obscene
book! When the result of the trial became known the
IN THE FIELD OF THEOLOGY. 13
Doctor was the recipient of letters from every quarter of
the globe expressive of the writers' indignation at the in-
justice done to one whom John P. Jewett, the veteran pub-
lisher, characterized in his letter to the Judge as “a noble,
generous-hearted, whole-souled man whose whole life has
been spent, not in planning deeds of darkness, but in ef-
forts to benefit mankind, and to leave the world better
than he found it.”
A CASE IN THE FIELD OF THEOLOGY.
In 1877 MR. D. M. BENNETT, the editor of the Zºruth
..Seeker and publisher of various books criticising orthodox
theology, was arrested on the charge of blasphemy and ob-
scenity, by Anthony Comstock, who entered the office of
the Truth Seeker accompanied by a United States Mar-
shal, whose function one would suppose to be the protec-
tion rather than the oppression of an American citizen
guilty of nothing worse than printing his honest opinions
upon theological and scientific subjects. The policy of mak-
ing such attacks is sharply and justly criticised in the ex-
tract from one of the Rev. Mr. Frothingham's discourses,
elsewhere presented, and need not be discussed in this
place. The facts connected with the arrest were quickly
communicated to Washington where such powerful influ-
ences were brought to bear as to cause an order to be is-
sued to discontinue the prosecution. And, still, twice
again has Mr. Bennett been arrested upon a similar
charge and under the sweeping provisions of the Com-
stock laws. Mr. Bennett is in heart and purpose a hu.
manitarian, with a constituency of not less than fifty
thousand intelligent men and women, who are the constant
readers of his publications. The TRUTH SEEKER—a large
8 page paper—has a circulation of about ten thousand per
week. His heart is so much in his work that from morn-
14 IN THE FIELD OF SOCIOLOGY.
ing till late at night, unless interrupted by Comstock ar-
rests, he may be found industriously plying the pen or
otherwise preparing works for the press. Clearly, if he be
a mistaken man, argument rather than abuse, truth rather
than lies conveyed in decoy letters from professedly
Christian sources, must be relied upon to turn him from
his present convictions and labors. All who personally
know the veteran liberal editor are impressed with his ro-
bust intellect, his childlike simplicity and his perfect
honesty of thought and purpose. He might be persecuted
into a conspicuous martyr, but no amount of persecution
and imprisonment would ever stamp on his honest brow
the brand of a criminal.
A CASE IN THE FIELD OF SOCIOLOGY.
In 1878 EzRA. H. HeywooD, of Princeton, Mass., edito"
of THE WORD and publisher of various works upon social
questions, was actually sentenced to two years imprison-
ment in Dedham Jail by Judge Clark, of the U. S. Cir-
cuit Court. Mr. Heywood was arrested by Comstock
without the shadow of a warrant, in a state which has been
conspicuous for its championship of the rights of men, and
was convicted, under the peculiar rulings of the judge, not-
withstanding the opinion of Hon. GEO. F. HoAR, U. S.
Senator, who wrote to Mr. Heywood before the trial that
“The line of distinction between honest argument intend-
“ed to convince the people that their opinions, laws, or so-
“cial and domestic arrangements are wrong, however mis-
“taken or even injurious in their results such arguments
“may be, and writings designed to inflame evil passions
“and minister to gross and depraved tastes, is a line which
“I think our Massachusetts jurors would be pretty sure to
“see and to keep.” Here was a man who upon his trial
was proved to sustain in the blace where he lived an irre-
FACTS WHICH ILLUSTRATE. 15:
proachable character, sent to jail to keep the company of
actual criminals, for the offense of having written, printed
and mailed his sincere opinions upon the institution of
marriage, which but a few years ago was freely discussed in
the columns of our daily papers by the late Mr. Greeley-
and Mr. James. However offensive Mr. Heywood's views.
may be to our most conservative people, they have been
broached by the leading thinkers of all times since the
world has had a written history, and the condemned pam-
phlet, as shown by Mr. Parker Pillsbury in a printed letter-
entitled “The Bible and Cupid's Yokes Contrasted,” is far
less open to the charge of obscenity than the “good
book” which ornaments the centre-tables and lies within.
the reach of children as well as adults in all Christian.
families. Therefore it is useless for the vice society to say
that it was obscenity rather than Mr. Heywood's opinions
which sent this personally excellent man to prison. Mr
Heywood in his youth stood shoulder to shoulder with
Theodore Parker, Elizur Wright, Mr. Garrison and Mr.
Phillips in championing the the cause of anti-slavery. His
whole life has been devoted to duty as he understands it,
and his photograph placed by the side of that of his ac--
cuser quickly shows which is the MAN and which is morally.
the criminal |
Since the foregoing was put in type Mr. Heywood has
been pardoned by President Hayes. The petitions of
6ooo people, the special petition of some of Boston's best
citizens and the efforts of our Defense Association which
sent the eloquent and persuasive Mrs. Laura Kendrick to
Washington to plead the cause of the prisoner have pre-
vailed, and with the aid of the good sense and power of the
President of the United States, a great wrong has been
righted, after Mr. Heywood had suffered six month's
confinement in Dedham jail. A large and enthusiastic re-
16 FACTS WHICH ILLUSTRATE.
“ception was accorded him on his release at Paine Hall in
Boston.
ANOTHER CASE OR TWO.
Now we will let these three cases representing the hard-
ships of persons laboring in three different fields of thought
suffice, although many more might be added, and turn to
a few others of a peculiar character.
DR. SARA. B. thase, a lady of education and refinement,
was rudely taken from her office and residence by Com-
stock for having sold a syringe : Her house was ransacked
and her good name was besmeared with misrepresentations
which her accuser managed to get into the columns of the
daily press. The Grand Jury refused to indict; Comstock
waited another month, and when a new jury was empan-
elled tried again ; failing in this, he awaited another change
and finally succeeded in getting two indictments against
the persecuted lady. The Prosecuting Attorney in his
indignation laid the facts before Judge Southerland, and
a motion for a nolle prosequi was granted. The Times,
Zribune and other papers criticised Comstock's course in
terms anything but complimentary.
Even in cases of actual obscenity it has been shown in
many instances that the Agent of the Vice Society has in-
duced his victims to commit a crime of which they otherwise
would have been innocent; and prominent among these
may be mentioned Mr. Chas. T. Blandin, who, while pur-
suing a perfectly legitimate calling, was actually, by lies
and friendly words, induced by Britton, Comstock's lieu-
tenant, to procure a photograph of some nude subject.—
Blandin was pardoned by the Governor as soon as the real
facts were revealed to him.
FACTS WHICH III,USTRATE. 17
A DISGUSTING AFFAIR.
Comstock's strange conduct in the house of prostitution
in Greene street should not be overlooked in this connection.
When it was first rumored about that the well known
and supposed honest representative of the New York
Society for the Suppression of Vice had lent his assistance
to a ſoul plot, instigated by a motorious criminal, for the
purpose of casting discredit on a worthy public official,
which plot involved the necessity of a fruitless raid upon a
house of ill-repute, every decent minded person doubted
the story, and declared it to be the fabrication of the ene-
mies of the devout and dilligent agent. When, however,
the facts were brought out in full in court, where the said
agent appeared as witness for the prosecution, his apolo-
gists were obliged to confess that they had not appreciated
the real character of the man, and were astonished to
learn the depths of depravity to which he could delve
with a zeal and interest which would not have been mani-
fested by one simply bent on the performance of duty;
for by the mouth of two eye-witnesses it was proved that
self-appointed detectives remained one hour and twenty
minutes in the presence of three women disporting in a
state of nudity, when one minute should have been all
sufficient for carrying out an honest purpose. Even the
fiſteen minutes acknowledged by Mr. Comstock himself
shows a sad perversion of taste, or an innate depravity not
becoming a member of a Christian Chureh, or the emi-
nently respectable men who are credited with being his
advisers. Their agent has in the public press stated that
none of his movements are made without previous consul,
tation with the executive committee of his society and the
obtaining of their assent. We prefer to assume that the
agent made an exception in this case, rather than to be-
3
18 THE GREENE STREET AFFAIR.
lieve that the honorable gentlemen of the executive com-
mittee were his accomplices in the nefarious proceeding
related below. The plain facts are that Mr. Comstock
with others paid $14.5o for the privilege of gazing for over
an hour upon the nude forms of three misguided and un-
fortunate women, in a disreputable house, and finally
caused their arrest and prosecution.
The following quotation from an account of the court
proceedings, written by Prof. A. L. Rawson, an esteemed
author of Biblical literature, may be depended upon as
accurate—though we have taken the liberty to abridge it
slightly for the pages of this little work.
PROF. RAWSON'S
REPORT OF THE GREENE STREET AFFAIR.
f
THOSE persons who read my account of Anthony Com-
stock's arrest of three girls in Greene street, this city, in my
speech at the Heywood Indignation Meeting in Faneuil
Hall, Boston, may have reflected that some corroboration
was needed for such damaging statements. Such further
proof has been derived from Mr. Comstock himself and
the witnesses whom he summoned to assist in convicting
the girls of unlawful conduct, which acts were the direct
result of his request and the bribe in money paid by him.
I was mistaken in one point, in that I said he deceived
the court in obtaining a warrant before the acts were com-
mitted. The ſact is, he made the arrests without a war-
rant, as he himself testified.
The case was tried before Judge H. A. Gildersleeve and
a jury, in the General Sessions, Part 2, Tuesday and
Wednesday mornings, Sept. 24th and 25th, 1878.
In opening the case, Assistant District Attorney Her-
ring said, among other things, that the Agent of the So-
ciety ſor the Suppression of Vice has deemed it his duty
PROF. RAWSON'S REPORT. 19
on several occasions to pass to other matters than that of
preventing the spread of obscene literature, and that this
case was one under that new head. He also said it was
his duty to call attention to the fact that it is claimed that
the crime charged was instigated by Mr. Comstock, and
that for vindictive purposes, and he desired the jury to
weigh the evidence carefully, and if they found that the
prisoners originated the criminal acts, to bring in their
verdict accordingly. But if they found that they were un-
duly and improperly persuaded by offers of reward in
money, and, being so urged, consented to do the acts re-
quested of them, the jury is to determine who are the
guilty parties.
Anthony Comstock was the first witness called. After
the usual preliminary items, he gave, in substance, the fol-
lowing: He became aequainted with the house and its
character about an hour before entering it, on the evening
of June 14th last, and went in with three officers and two
friends. Mrs. DeForrest was not in the house at the time,
(9 o'clock), and he was shown into the back parlor. He
inquired about the performance that he expected to see,
having made arrangements for something of the kind
previously, and the money was paid by Mr. Comstock to the
women. (The officer who was with Mr. Comstock at the
time thinks $20 was the sum paid; Comstock said $14.50.)
Mr. Comstock then detailed the incidents of the exhibition
in such rude and plain language that the Judge ordered the
officer to clear the court of all ladies who were not wit-
nesses in the case. The language and style of Mr. Com-
stock, as given in this particular case, does him large credit
for having become very familiar with forbidden things.-
However, he said, by way of saving appearances, that he
could barely remain in the room, as witness of the offensive
exhibition, fifteen or twenty minutes. Officer Sheldon, who
29 THE GREENE STREET AFFAIR.
was in the same room, says Mr. Comstock was in there one
Åour and twenty minutes, as near as he can recollect. Mr.
Comstock's memory might possibly have become affected
by the peculiarities of the occasion, and hence the apparent
contradiction between his and the officer's statement.
Mr. Britton was called, and said he is also employed by
the same society that pays Mr. Comstock ($8O.Oo a week).
He knew of the business on hand for the evening, ſor he
had been busy with Mr. Comstock and Mr. Gurney for a
week or two in “working up the ca-e.” Mr. Britton was
anxious to sustain his chief, Comstock, and said that they
were there to see “a regular exhibition.” (They both re-
peated the word “regular” many times, as John Brougham
does in the case of the officer in the “regular army,” but
not with the same happy effect.) Mr. Britton confirmed
the statement of officer Sheldon as to Comstock's presence
for an hour and a quarter or more in the exhibition room /
Officer Sheldon thought that Comstock ordered the wine
for the party. Somebody brought the wine, and the party
drank. He says he made the arrest by order of Comstock,
and that he was acting under the orders of his superior,
who had directed him to obey Mr. Comstock on that oc-
casion.
That was about all the evidence for the prosecution, and
the Judge discharged the three girls, holding Mrs. De For-
est only on the charge of keeping a disorderly house. The
case was adjourned to the next day. Mr. Gurney was
subpoenaed, but was not found. *
The defense did not call a witness. None were needed.
On opening the case Mr. John Mott, counsel ſor the ac-
cused, moved the Court to direct the jury to acquit on the
ground that the evidence was insufficient to sustain the
charge, and said, beside other things, that there had been
no evidence offered that any criminal conduct was even
PROF. RAWSON'S REPORT. £1.
witnessed in that house before this instance, and that the
law was not designed to protect rogues in their unlawful
intercourse with each other. In this case one rogue had
“put up a job,” and he and the complainant, Comstock,
set on foot the very unlawful acts of which he complained.
In reply to the argument for this motion the Assistant
District Attorney, Mr. Herring, said that he felt it to be
his duty to shield Mr. Comstock from certain apparent
facts which seemed to have been devised to bring disgrace
and odium on the Captain of the precinct in which this
1aid had been made. He said that Gurney is a motorious
criminal, who has served several terms in state prisons, and
that the Captain would not allow him to carry on business
in his precinct, and he (Gurney) had sought out this Com-
stock, and they together had tried this means of bringing
disgrace and odium on the Captain's head. It may be
that Mr. Comstock was innocently trapped at the first, and
this might have been shown if Gurney could have been
brought into court. But the man cannot be found.
Then the Judge, in closing the case, said, besides many
other things, that, in the absence of the statement just
made by the District Attorney, he should have felt bound
to submit the case to the jury.
His honor said his court could not be used to fasten a
stigma on the name of a worthy man, a captain of the po-
lice, for the purpose of carrying out any man's schemes of
private vengeance. The Judge criticised the manner in
which the prosecution had been conducted. He said that
the roundsman of the precinct is not here, the police are
not here, no one of the neighborhood is here to tell us of
the character of the house, although it would have been
very easy to have had any one or all of them here to tes-
tify to their knowledge of its reputation.
It is too bad that justice should be cheated in this affair,
£2 THE GREENE STREET AFFAIR.
for his honor said he had no doubt of the guilt of Mrs. De
lºorest in keeping a disorderly house, although the evidence
is circumstantial. But the vilest have rights, and if guilty
are entitled to be tried in a legitimate and fair manner,
without being the victims of fraud and deceit, and he
would have punished the guilty if he could have done so
without reflecting on the character of a worthy man and
tpublic officer. He then directed the jury to find a verdict
•of acquittal, which they did.
For the sake of common humanity we may be glad that
this conspiracy failed, and that the captain on one hand
and the poor women on the other were protected by the
•court from the unscrupulous attacks of a hardened criminal
who was thirsting for vengeance, and the Agent of the So-
•ciety for the Suppression of Vice, who, in this case at least,
-seemed quite ready to lend the dignity of his office for un-
worthy and almost inhuman purposes.
In view of this righteous termination of the conspiracy,
1 am still of the opinion that it would be well to amend
the title to Anthony's society so that it shall read “The
TNew York Society for the Manufacture and Suppression of
*Vice.” A. L. RAWSON IN THE Truth Seeker.
[From the Grand Rapids (Mich.) Daily Times.]
It must be admitted that the story, (referring to the
•Greene street affair) bears upon its face some evidence of
auntruth. It seems absurd to suppose that any man repre-
=senting a Christian cause could descend to such depths of
infamy. And yet, when we remember the sort of hair-pin
which Anthony Comstock is; when we call to mind some
—of the equally despicable subterfuges which he has em-
-ployed in the past, it seems not altogether unreasonable to
\believe that he could be guilty of the thing charged.
GOmments of the Press,
ALTHOUGH the Press has been timid and time-
serving in its treatment of Comstock and his ig-
norant censorship, we have enough material at
hand to fill more than one hundred pages with the
indignant utterances of newspaper writers who
have been appalled at the injustice inflicted under
the laws instigated and used by Comstock. We
will only spare room for a few extracts, enough to
show that the Press is not dead but sleepeth.
[From the New York Daily World.]
ANTHONY COMSTOCK ON HANS MAKART.
Mr. Andrew J. Hope keeps a candy store on Fulton
street, near Pearl. He is not only a confectioner but a
patron of the arts. A few weeks ago he purchased from
Mr. Wm. Schaus a finely executed and handsomely framed
water-color copy of Hans Makart's painting of “Charles
the Fifth's Entry into Antwerp.” The original, which is
now on exhibition in the Art Gallery of the Paris Exposi-
tion, has been much talked of by European critics and
connoisseurs. It represents the King's triumphal proces-
sion through the streets of the ancient Flemish city, and in
the foreground there are several figures of nude women,
apparently representing heralds of the royal coming. Mr.
Hope's copy was exhibited for several weeks in Mr. Schau's
shop window, and when he purchased it Mr. Hope placed
24 EROM THE NEW YORK WORLD.
it in his window. There it remained up to last Thursday,
when Mr. Anthony Comstock, of the Society for the Sup-
pression of Vice, saw it. Mr. Comstock at once sought Mr.
Hope and informed him that the picture was obscene, and
that he would not permit it to be exhibited any longer.—
Mr. Hope persisted, but in vain. Mr. Comstock declared
that if the picture was not removed he would seize it and
arrest its owner. Mr. Hope says that he did not care to
have a conflict with so powerful a society as the one that
Mr. Comstock claims to represent. He accordingly prom-
ised that the objectionable painting should be exhibited no
more, and he caused it to be covered with a placard with
the following inscription: & gº
A CARD TO THE PUBLIC.
I purchased of William Schaus, of Broadway, the in-
closed picture which he had on exhibition in his window, a
water-color copy of Makart's great historical painting of
“Charies the Fifth's Entry into Antwerp,”
which is at present all the rage at the Exposition. Being
the only copy which would reach this country before
Christmas, I took pride in showing it to the public.
A gentleman claiming to be the Society for the Pre-
vention of Cruelty to Morality came into my store and
peremptorily ordered it out of the window.
THE WORLD also had an editorial upon the same subject,
which we have abr.dged:
COMSTOCK VS. MAKART.
It is eminently desirable either that the Society for the
Suppression of Vice should get another agent in the place
of Mr. Anthony Comstock, or that it should cease to clothe
its agent with judicial functions and require him to take
counsel of some person of sense and discretion before
• ther making or threatening seizure.
COMMENTS OF THE PRESS. 25.
It has been repeatedly charged upon this agent of the
Society for the Suppression of Vice that he is not in the
least scrupulous about the methods he employs to do even
the legitimate and necessary work which falls to him, and
that he is quite willing to entrap into an offense a person
who otherwise might not commit an offense, for the pur-
pose of procuring a conviction and making a show of ac-
tivity.
The DAILY GRAPHIc of the 11th expressed, the following
opinion:
• If the public indignation does not now give a pause to.
Anthony Comstock's trespasses beyond the pale of his au-
thority, the galleries of the city may yet be stripped of their
very choicest gems of art.
THE NATION of the 7th, in commenting upon what
THE World had to say upon the same subject, used this.
language:
If this is true, the time has come for some public-spirited
person to resist the Society for the Suppression of Vice, and
if possible, punish such uncalled-for interference with pri-
vate rights. Makart's picture is thirty feet long, and the
figures in the extreme foreground are much larger than
life; those in the middle distance and full light are life
size. It stands all across one of the entrances to the Aus-
trian gallery, and an honor is paid to it which no other
picture of āll the thousands at the Champ-de-Mars this.
year has received : fixed seats are set before it at what is.
assumed to be the best distance. Now a small colored
print of it is pronounced unfit for a New York shop window f
THE PHILADELPHIA TIMEs, in making comments on the
same subject, used this language:
Mr. Anthony Comstock has been making an ass of him-
4.
26 FROM THE NEW YORK GRAPHIC.
j
self. We say this advisedly, because there is no reason to
suppose that Mr. Comstock was made $6 by nature. He
is a man with a hobby; but like other men with hobbies,
Mr. Comstock does not always use the best of judgment,
and lately he has been bringing ridicule on his work by
some very absurd and arbitrary proceedings. But in a
matter of aesthetics Mr. Anthony Comstock is scarcely
qualified to act as censor, and if his patrons and employers,
the directors of the Society for the Suppression of Vice,
wish-their work to succeed, they would do well to suppress
their agent a little.
THE SOCIETY FOR THE SUPPRESSION OF VICE.
THE NEw York GRAPHIC sees both sides of the shield :
“While all good citizens desire a vigorous suppression of
impure literature, the Society for the Suppression of Vice
would do well to move cautiously in suppressing works
which are merely expressions of opinion. Touch upon
the right of free publication, and hundreds and thousands
of people become interested at once upon the side of the
accused. The prosecution and imprisonment of Heywood
was, in this sense, seemingly a grave mistake. It has
given him and his pamphlets a notoriety and his views a
circulation which would otherwise never have been ob-
tained. The trouble is, that when an organization is once
formed the superintendents and agents are under a con-
stant spur to call attention to themselves and their work,
and after they have successfully attacked really objection-
able publications they are very apt to proceed against per-
sons who only hold objectionable opinions. Then, too, the
methods by which Comstock gets his evidence are not
such as commend themselves to public morality. Tempt-
ing people to do wrong and then arresting them is not the
kind of business any law-abiding community can counte-
FROM THE METHODIST. 27
nance. It inevitably leads to abuse. The Society for the
Suppression of Vice would do well hereafter to be more
tliscreet in the prosecution of cases which bring up the
Fight of free discussion, for by straining the law they only
*njure the cause they have at heart.”
[From the M. Y. Methodist, of Feb. 12, 1876.]
VILE PRINTS AND THE POST OFFICE.
“How to suppress obscene literature is a question be-
fore the public. The circulation of filthy or demoralizing
papers and books is one of the vast evils of the times;
and it offends our better feeling to know that the Govern-
ment of the United States is, through the mails, the agent
for the distribution of this foul matter. It is therefore
proposed to arm the government with the power of search
as a means of suppression, and to relieve the government
of its unwilling service in distributing such literature.—
The evil is shocking, and the use of the post-office for such
devil's work a very painful fact. But the remedy is worse
than the disease. The mails ought to be, and are, open to
judicial examination ; vesting a discretionary power of
scrutiny in public officers is quite another matter and of
most dangerous tendency.
The liberty of correspondence is fundamental, and has
become a part of the freedom of the press. In taking
charge of mail matter, the government cannot undertake
to be in any sense responsible for what goes through the
mails. Seducers, thieves and murderers use the mails to
deceive, plot, and ruin. Every day, the government, ac-
cording to the logic of some people, helps to corrupt
women, break into banks, and take human life. For, mes-
sages that p. oduce these results are constantly received
and delivered by postmasters. Any checks that are con-
28 A SIGN OF THE WILEST DESPOTISM.
sistent with liberty we should earnestly favor, but we
should not reason that the smallest responsibility attaches
to the government for sins committed by the use of a free
post-office.
The power that is asked for is certain to be abused.—
We remember when southern postmasters refused to de-
liver the TRIBUNE to subscribers, on the ground that it
was “incendiary matter.” Nobody needs to be told that,
in any political campaign, any political party having con-
trol of the post-offices would use its power to hinder the
other l arty, that the sacredness of private letters would
be subject to the needs of partisans and the whims of ig-
norant or rabid postmasters. An inspected mail-bag is
the sign of the vilest despotism. That thing became so
vulgarly shameless in Italy that travelers were unblush-
ingly told the office had not yet read their letters. * *
The evil must be reached in other ways. Liberty has
evils of its own, but it is worth a hundred fold more than
the best despostism. The people who would like to sup-
press sin by main force believe that they would suppress
only sin. Pius Ninth believed that he suppressed only sin
while ruling the most vicious and ignorant population in
the Italian Peninsula. Despotism may mean well in its
sources; it becomes wicked and corrupt long be'ore it
reaches the masses under it. You must meet sin CHIEFLY
by moral and rel gious restraint; a little can be done by a
free country through its laws, and that little we shall always
favor. But we are not willing to sacrifice, or even to put
in peril, a free correspondence and a free press for any pur-
pose whatever. Parents, teachers and ministers must cor-
rect the tastes, correct the ignorance, and promote the pu-
rity of lads and lasses. They cannot invent a machine to
do their work, or lighten it, or make it easy. It is a mighty
task, a war in which there are no truces, a laboring day
FROM THALL’S JOURNAL OF HEALTH. 29
that never sends, a burden to be borne by each one of us
while life lasts, to be borne by somebody so long as sin
exists in the world.
ſProm Hall's Journal of Health, Dec., 1876, pp. 496-7.]
FAMOUS THROUGH PERSECUTION.
“DR. E. B. Foote, a very entertaining and popular
writer, and a scientific gentleman, withal, has received
one hundred thousand doll rs of advertising through the
efforts of a Mr. Coms' ock, who complained that the Doctor
was employing the U. S. mails for the convevance of im-
modest literature, against which offence a clumsy sort of a
1aw exists. So the Doctor got fined, and subsequently
published a voluminous acount of his trial for the techni-
cal offence. The absurdity of the enactment was made
clear, so far as it has been con-trued as having any refer-
ence to medical works, and a few more cases of this sort
would be quite likely to breed a good sized rebellion
among medical writers and publishers. * * *
“The D ctors Foote—father and son—publish a v ry
able magazine for general reading, called DR. Foote's
HEALTH MonTHLY, and in this work the whole prosecu-
t on and persecution business has been reported, together
with hosts of letters from the public at large expressive of
sympathy, and contributing money for the payment of the
fine. This money is accepted and credited up to the
sender on account of subscriptions, at one dollar a year, to
THE HEALTH MONTHLY.
“As for the character of Dr. Foote's books, we can only
say, that while they tell a good deal of naked truth in plain
language, he must be a prurient prude indeed who is able
to detect anything immodest in the expressions made use
of. Abuses and errors are pointed out in vigorous lan"
3
30 FROM THE POSITIVE THINKER.
guage, but there is no indelicacy of utterance, and the mind
which could thus construe it must be polluted indeed.—
As medical writers, we protest ag inst the law not less than
against this last construction of it, and shall see to it that
it be so modified by Congress as to exclude medical men
from its operation, since they necessarily have to handle
topics which the world has been taught to consider “deli-
cate.” Corruptors of the morals of the young, who in est
our cities and work secret pollut on through obscene litera-
ture and pictures among the inexperienced, should be
swept from the earth as vile enem'es of mankind; but we
cannot long permit such misguided censorship of the press
or mals as is calculated to lessen scientific discussion, or
keep the world in ignorance of vital truth.”
[From the Positive Thinker.]
THE OPINION OF A LIBERAL ORGAN.
We have, from the first, deprecated the prominence given
to this miserable obscenity question, believing that the evil
has been exaggerated, and that its suppression, be it greater
or less, might far better have been left to the vigilance of
parents and teachers and to the municipal authorities,
rather than to retain Congressional statutes on a subject
where the boundary between what is obscene, either in
language or representation, is so indistinct and indefinable
that any attempt to fix it must not only be futile but must
necessarily lead to an abridgment of personal liberty and
* become a tool in the hands of bigoted and bad men in
power to stifle opinions distasteful tº, them, or to crush
their enemies. But even were t not so, is it possible to
frame any such statute that would not exclude from the
mails the best part of the literature of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries? If Mr. Abbot, of the INDEx. who
WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN. 31
thinks that a law can be framed that will define where ob-
scenity in language or representation begins and ends, a. d.
which cannot be perverted and made an instrument for the
abridgment of personal liberty and of the freedom of the
press, will take the pains to read the speeches of such dis-
tinguished statesmen as Webster, Benton, Calhoun, Clay,
Davis and others, when this subject was up for discussion
in Congress in 1836, he will, we think, be convinced that
it is an impossible task, and what such eminent legal minds
confessed could not be done and ought not to be attempted,
he should not think of trying.
Just here is the weak point in Mr. Abbot's argument for
reform in the matter of the Comstock laws. He does not
seem to discriminate between the powers conferred by the
Constitution on the States and on Congress and those re-
served to the people. By the power delegated to the State,
it may, and ought to protect itself and its citizens against
evils and crimes, and to do this, it is in its province to de-
termine on matters of morals, but no such power has been
conferred on Congress except in the District of Columbia
and in the Territories, over which it is authorized to exer-
cise both general and municipal power. Just so far as
Congress attempts any such discrimination in matters of
opinion or morals it is an usu pation of power which
should not be tolerated.
|From Dr. Foote's Health Monthly.]
WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN.
It is a fact known to all who have given attention to the
subject that all the indecent books, pictures and other de-
vices which Mr. Comstock uses before legislative and Con-
gressional committes were captured BEFoRE the statutes now
known as the Comstock laws were enacted. Now, if aſter
32 ONLY TWO ALTERNATIVES.
having absolutely suppressed all of the really indecent
things Mr. Comstock had taken hold of some legitimate
business or profession which would have occupied a mod-
erate share of his attention, and which would have yielded
by the aid of a moderate salary from the Society for the
Suppression of Vice a good living income, he might have
lived a useful and honorable life, without meeting any se-
rious opposition from any reputable quarter. But if he
persists in the course which he is now pursuing either this
country will cease to be a republic or Comstockism will be
driven to the wall. It is plain that there are but these two
alternatives. Either the institutions which were builded
by our fathers will have to go down or the American In-
quisition will. Whether the contest between these two is
to be protracted, entailing much suffering upon those who
are outspoken and who will not tamely submit to the ex-
isting censorship, or to be short and decisive, is for the pub-
lic at large to determine. Thanks to the hereditary quali-
ties which have been handed down from the early colonists,
who were disposed to submit to all sorts of privations and
dangers rather than bear the yoke of tyranny, there is not
a small band of resolute men and women who are willing to
make their homes in the prison cells and bear temporarily
the outrageous and unjust charge of being “obscenists”
rather than yield one jot or tittle of their rights as American
citizens. It is often predicted that the agent of the Society
for the Suppression of Vice will come to a tragic end. We
hope not. That man should never be created into a mar-
tyr. His destruction would be his martyrdom. The long
and honored catalogue which has come down through the
ages should never be stained by such a name. But we de-
voutly hope that the strong common sense of the most en-
lightened people on the face of the earth will giapple with
the great “WHAT is IT,” which has suddenly intruded
COMMENTS OF THE PRESS. 83
itself in a nation of freemen, and put it down with such
force that it never can again raise its impudent and ob.
streperous head. If all of our readers, and we have thou-
sands of them, would make even small contributions to our
NATIONAL DEFENSE ASSOCIATION the unclean bird would
soon have his wings so clipped that he could soar no higher
than the ground where, and where only, the carrion which
it is his function and delight to feast upon, can be found,
HASTY LEGISLATION TO BE CHECKED.
Senator Edmunds has presented resolutions to the effect
that neither House of Congre-s shall send a bill to the
other for concurrence on the last three days of the session,
and that none shall be sent to the President on the last
day without a three-fourths vote in each House. We
strongly suspect that these resolutions have been instiga-
ted by the ill-advised and hasty legislation which charac-
teriz-d the closing hous of the 42ni Congress, when some
two or three hundred bills were rushed through at random,
and among them the Comstock statutes. If such resolu-
tions had been adopted freviously to that Congress we
might have been spaled the disgrace of the infamous postal
laws and the wrongs which have been perpetrated under
them.
THE SPRINGFIELD REPUBLICAN says: “The President
has done justly in this release” (speaking of the pardon
of Mr. Heywood) “for we must maintain the right of the
citizen to freely maintain theories that are even subver-
sive of society; our corner-stone is liverty.”
tº To pronounce the holding of certain ideas illegal
and to make martyrs of people holding them is the most
infalli le method of propagating them ever devised.-
[THE DAILY World.
4.
*
3.34 COMMENTS OF THE PRESS.
ADVICE TO COMSTOCK.
OLIVER JOHNSON, the veteran editor, formerly of the
—Anti-Slavery Standard, later of the New York Independent,
Jater still of the New York Weekly Tribune, after hat of
Beecher's CHRISTIAN UNION, and at present the propr.elor
-of one of the ablest journals issued out of New York,-
THE ORANGE (N.J.) Journal—in his paper of May 25 h,
1878, said:
There are honest differences of opinion among mer
cupon some very important and delicate physiological q' es-
tions, and it is not for Mr. Comstock to make himself a
-doctrinaire, to suppress by violence the right of speech and
•of printing upon such subjects. He must remember that
it is possible for very good people to hold opinions contrary
to his own, and contrary even to those generally held in
‘the community, upon physiological subjects; and i he
“would retain the good. will of the community he should
learn how to discriminate between the agents and abettors
of impurity, and well-meaning people, however mista-
ken, who are laboring, according, to their best light, to
promote the public welfare.
The Boston SUNDAY HERALD says ANTHONY CoMStock
is too pure, or too impure, to live in this world of tempta-
itions. His last feat, ordering a copy of Hans Makart's
-great pictºre of Charles V in Antwerp from a store in
New York, because there were some nude figures in it,
=shows the narrow spirit of the man. What a pleasant
state of things would we have if he were able to carry out
this ideas' Venus would be put in petticoats, and Narcis-
asus would get fitted to a pair of pantaloons. Even Eve,
Emother of the race, could not be represented until after
the fall. Mr. Comstock ought to be put into a dimly
Highted ice-closet.
The Pen, Pulpit and Platform,
UNDER this head we will group, without any at-
tempt at precise order, such pen, pulpit and plat—
form utterances as may not have found appropri-
ate place elsewhere. Many “orthodox” clergy-
men have spoken their views in private letters, and
soon, if “the Agent” keeps on, we hope they wilb
have the courage to come out from their ambus—
cade and openly attack the arch enemy of Americans
freedom. Many are already impressed with the:
fact that with a preponderance of sentiment in any-
community opposed to their cherished convictions,—
the same statutes might be used for suppressing:
the Scriptures. They are not unmindful of the
possibility of the tables some day being turned, if
this precedent be allowed to obtain a fixed foot-
hold in our laws and usages. They cannot afford
to be silent. Meanwhile we will quote those of
liberal tendencies who have openly expressed them—
selves. Here again we can but spare room for a
few samples. And these will not appear until we-
present some clearly written arguments and com—
ments upon the unconstitutionality of the so-
called Comstock laws. We will open with as
“little grape” from a gun thus far unanswered.
36 PEN, PULPIT AND PLATFORM.
MR. T. B. W.A.K.EMAN
ON THE UNCONSTITUTIONALITY
OF THE COMSTOCK LAWS.
No one can read the admirable address of Mr. T. B.
WAKEMAN, before the great Indignation Meeting at Fan-
euil Hall, in Aug., 1878, without being impressed with the
entire unconstitutionality of what are called the Comstock
Laws, notwithstanding the fact that they have been pro-
nounced constitutional by the Supreme Court. We have
room however for only the following brief extract. Those
who would like to read the address entire can obtain it for
only five cents per copy by addressing the President of the
DEFENSE AssocCATION, PROF. A. L. RAwson, No. 34 Bond
street, New York. The small profit above cost will go
into the treasury of the Association.
It should be remembered that postal questions are far
different in this country from what they are in England,
where Parliament can do anything except, as it is said,
make a man of a woman, or a woman of a man ; that is,
physical impossibility is the only limit of Parliamentary
power. There the power over the post-offices and people
is comparatively unrestricted. But our general govern-
ment has only the special powers granted in the Eighth
Article of the Constitution and such implied powers as
“are necessary and proper to carry those special powers
into effect.” -
The simple and single word to “establish " post-offices
and post-roads was in no wise intended to grant to Con-
gress the British ulterior power of using them after they
were established for objects not committed to Congress at
all, but specially reserved to the people of states, by amend-
ments 9 and Io. That no such ulterior power was ever
intended is clear from history. One of the great difficulties
MR. WAKEMAN’S ADDRESS. $7
n procuring the adoption of the Constitution arose from
ithe fear of these implied powers. Every clause was gone
over and over in the Convention that framed the Consti-
tution, and in the Conventions of the several States, to dis-
cover how these powers might be wrenched to destroy the
liberties of the people. It is very significant that no one
ever then supposed that this power “to establish post-
offices and post-roads " could be other than such as should
be simply devoted to that end. Luther Martºn and Patrick
Henry, who went over every word to find objections, saw
none in this clause, and the authors of the FEDERAList
(in No. 42) make their only reference to the subject in these
few words: “The power of establishing post roads must
in every view be a harmless power, and may, perhaps, by
judicious management, become productive of great public
conveniency. Nothing which tends to facilitate the inter-
course between States can be deemed unworthy of the ub-
lic care.” This plainly means that the postal power must
be always, and in every way, harmless since it was only for
the public “conveniency” of facilitating intercourse be-
tween the States. Little did those patriots dream that a
hundred years hence a grant in every point of view so
“HARMLEss” would grow by construction of an implied
power into a terrinle penal statute that has nothing to do
with the “conveniency” of the post-office, or of the people,
or with facilitating their intercourse, but which seeks to
prevent and limit all these for the ulterior object of super-
vising morality. Had the possibility of this ulterior power
been suspected then, the Constitution would never have
been ratified. Let any one who doubts it turn over the
pages of Elliot's debates on the Constitution (especially
the Virginia convention), the FEDERALIST, and the second
volume of George Ticknor Curtis' “History of the Con-
stitution.”
38 PEN, PULPIT AND PLATFORM.
*
THE HON. ELIZUR WRIGHT FOR REPEAL.
In the Boston INDEx of Dec. 27th, 1877, may be found
a stirring article from the Hon. ELIZUR WRIGHT, of Bos-
ton, an honored name which has been intima ely associated
with the watch-word Ame it an liberty for fully a third
of a century:
“I think,” says this truly great man,” Congress his no
occasion, and therefore no right, to legislate on the subject,
except f r the District of Columbia and the Territories.—
Moreover, I think its act touching the circulation of ob-
scene publications through the mails is an outrageous vio-
lation of the Constitution, incapable of any modification
which could make it either cons itutional or safe. I wish
to sign a p tition f r its total and immediate repeal even at
the risk of being classed with the vilest publicans and sin-
ners, if anybody sees fit so to class me. Let men be punished
for obscenity or treason, if they are guilty of either, but not
for sending either through the mails. If it has come to
that, that these two crime-, or any crimes, cannot be sup-
pressed without invading the sacred privacy of the people's
correspondence, we had better abolish the post-office.”
We wish we could find rcom for this enti e article, but
we can only spare space now for the foregoing and a por-
tion of the concluding paragraph, which is as follows:
“The simple truth is, that the Society for the Suppres-
sion of Vice does not care a pin for the suppression of the
clandestine and really vile book-trade; but, taking advan-
tage of the great elas icity of the adjective “obscene,”
they first make a raid upon the clandestine trade as a cover
to their attack up n the science of human physiology, in
the interest of their peculiar religion. Pretending and
loudly bragging to have done the work of the police au-
thorities better than they ever did it or could do it them-
MR. PARTON'S LETTER. 39
selves, they now come to their real work, which is to sup-
press science and cultivate ignorance and superstition among
the people. The honest and self-sacrificing men and wo.
men who are laboring openlº, e rn stly and intelligently
to prevent socia' corruption and keep men and women out
of hell-upon-earth by instructing them in the laws of life
and health, are pounced upon as if they were pimps and
harlots.”
MR. JAMES PARTON FOR REPEAL
NEwBURYPORT, MAss., Sept. 29, 1878.
MY DEAR FRIEND: I think those Comstock laws, as
they are very properly called, ought to be totally repealed,
... and for these reasons :
I. Because they are Comstock laws, and not the delib-
erate judgment of Congress.
2. Because they are useless. The forbidden articles can
still be sent everywhere by express.
3. Because it is not possible to put into human language
a definition of the word obscene which shall let the Song
of Solomon, Rabelais, Juvenal and Tom Jones pass, and
keep out works intended and calculated to corrupt.
4. Because the control of the Government over the mails
is obviously limited to what you well style “postal reasons.”
Dynamite may be excluded ; sealing wax may be excluded;
liquids may be excluded—beeause they endanger the ful-
fillment of the contract with all the other senders of mail-
matter. But the Government is not called upon to sit in
judgment upon the moral character or intellectual quality
of the parcels entrusted to it.
5. Because the laws in question are so liable to abuse by
a narrow-minded or provincial officer. They enable the
prim and prudish village to judge and condemn the metro-
Polis.
40 PEN, PULPIT AND PLATFORM.
6. Because the state laws and municipal laws, previously
and now existing, are sufficient for the detection and pun-
ishment of all real offenders against decency and good
morals.
With regard to the constitutional argument, so ably and
powerfully presented by yourself, I can only say, being no
lawyer, that it seems to be unanswerable. It came upon
my mind with convincing power, and I have never had a
doubt since. These laws are wrong every way, and per-
nicious in many ways. You know how I hate and loathe
the books and papers that circulate among boys, which can
Have no other than a corrupting effect. I could join, heart
and hand, in hanging a wretch who, for a little money,
would either write, or publish, or sell such works. And
yet it seems to me that the espionage of mails by an illiter-
ate person is even a worse evil than that. It menaces the
very citadel of liberty.
Yes, I go for immediate and unconditional repeal; and
this has been my feeling ever since reading your masterly
speech delivered in Faneuil Hall last summer.
Very truly yours, JAMES PART.on.
T. B. WAKEMAN.
REV. O. B. FROTHINGHAM FOR REPEAL.
No. 5o WEST 36TH STREET, }
NEw York, Nov. 18, 1878.
My DEAR SIR: Your note of the Ioth inst. admonishes
me of a duty that should have been discharged before—the
duty of telling you that your argument on the “Comstock
Postal Law” has made me an advocate of REPEAL vs.
MoDIFICATION. The discussion of this autumn has brought
ne to the conclusion that this is the simple, logical, sen-
sible and only satisfactory method of dealing with the ob-
anoxious piece of legislation. The liberals of the other
PARKER PILLSBURY'S BROADSIDE. 41
opinion call for repeal of as much of the law as threatens
freedom of thought and discussion. The insolent associa-
tion of Free-thought with obscenity so stirs my indignation
that for honor's sake, if for no other reason, I should feel
compelled to demand that the whole be swept away. The
friends of decency must look for safeguards elsewhere.
Yours cordially, O. B. FROTHINGHAM.
To T. B. WAKEMAN.
PARKER PILLSBURY FOR REPEAL.
“Talk of amending such a law as this l’exclaims that
veteran champion of liberty, MR. PARKER PILLSBURY.- .
. “Enacted in such a way, and for such purposes, and at
such instigation, and committed to the care of a single in-
dividual for execution ; and of such an individual as he
has proved hims lif; and after such attempted execution
as we have already seen, and with such success | Talk of
MENDING a burlesque !—a mockery like that P Rather
tear it from the statute-book it so disgraces, and let it be
burned by the common hangman at the front of every
court-house in the United States, and let all the people say,
Amen ;
THE PETITION FOR REPEAL ;
WERE THE APPENDED NAMES FORGERIES2
THE NEw York Evangelist in its issue of Jan. 16,
1879, publishes a letter from Boston, in whi h occurs t e
following :
“About a month before Heywood's sentence Congress
was petitioned for the repeal of the Nati nal laws col cern-
ing the transmission of obscene matter through the mails.
Th: petition had nearly 70.Ooo signatures, and am ng
them was a numerous list of the most prominent and influ-
5
42 THE PETITIONS FOR REPEAL.
ential men in New York and elsewhere. Mr. Comstock
became aware of this fact and went to those men personally,
every one of whom declared that his name was a forgery !”
There are har ly words in the English language suffi-
ciently str ng to charact rize this statement. We prefer
Mr. GREELEY's strong Saxon, and denounce 1t as a down-
r ght lie I We defy Mr. Comstock to produce his
proof. *
Wh le t'e petitions were being circulated a circular was
printed by a publisher inviting book-sellers, druggis's, etc.,
to participate in the movement for r peal. To this cir-
cular it was charged that names were appended without
the permission of the parties concerned. A controversy
sprang up about this matter. But it in no way involved
the i t grity of the petitions for repeal. The circular
moreover was immediately withdrawn. -
The Rev. Joseph Cook has given currency to the same
falsehood and intimates that quite likely the names of the
6ooo petitioners for Heywood's Release were also forged
It is sufficient to say there is not a shadow of truth in these
statements or insinuations, and until such proof is brought
forward it is not necessay for the friends of the petition to
br ng proof to this denial. The National Defense Asso-
ciation has in its possession a very handsome photograph
of the Boston petition for Mr. Heywood's releas, bearing
the signatures of many of Boston's best citizens. The
characteristic signatures prove their authen icity beyond
: Il doubt. Some of the signers take pains in a note to ex-
press their dissent from Mr. Heywood's views, but ex ress
in strong erms the r denuncation ºf the outrage of im-
prisoning Mr. Heywood for Qpinion's sake.
One word more about the 7o.ooo petitioners for repeal:
their nam s ere not ga'hered up in the street of the me-
iropoli, but were mosly gathered in rom the conse vat ve
WERE THE NAMES FORGERIES P 43
little villages throughout the United States, and among
them were he names of clergymen of all denominations,
teachers, lawye s, doctors, merchants artisans, farmers and
clear-brained and honest-hearted people in all the various
walks of life. The petition doubtless remains in the H lls
of Congr ss to-day, and we challenge any one to examine
its hundreds o. yards of n m es and then come to the con-
clusion that they are forgeries. How strange it is that in
this contest between ndependent men and women and the
so-called “high-toned respectability,” the first work to be
performed is t , cut away a underbrush of downright
lies p anted and watered by these very “high-to, ed re-
spectables "
THE VOICE OF JEFFERSON.
Though long since deceased the great writer of the De-
claration of Independence, THOMAS JEFFERSON, still speaks.
In a recent case before the Supreme Court the Chief Jus-
tice said that the word “religion " not being defined in
the Constitution, we must go elsewhere to ascertain its
meaning; and he said nowhere could we more appropri-
ately look than to the history of the times in the midst of
which the Constitution was adopted. He then proceeded
to say that in the preamble of an act introduced in the
Virginia House of Delegates by Jefferson, in 1785, religious
freedom was defined, and after reciting “that to suffer the
. civil magistrate to intrude his powers into the field of
“opinion, and to restrain the profession or propagation of
“principles on the supposition of their ill-tendency is a
“dangerous fallacy, which at once destroys all religious
."liberty,” it declared “that it is time enough for the right-
“ful purposes of civil government for its officers to inter-
“fere when principles break out into overt acts against
44 PEN, PULPIT AND PLATFORM.
“peace and good order.” “In these two sentences,” adds
“the Chief Justice, “is found the true distinction between
“what properly belongs to the Church and what to the
“State.”
This must be accepted as the latest decision of the Su-
preme Court of the United States, and in the face of it
what wrongs are being perpetrated against orderly citizens
by the Vice Societies and their agents.
THE REV. HENRY WARD BEECHER.
All old-time reformers who have been in the habit of
looking up and finding HENRY WARD BEECHER in the
foreground as one of their leading standard-bearers have of
late years been disappointed at not always finding him in
his accustomed place. But now and then we look up in
our weary march and find him there. In his sermon of
Sunday, Dec. I5, 1878, he is reported as follows:
The preacher pleads for more leniency towards those
who have once transgressed the law, divine or human. As
it is now, he said, a man might as well run on the spear
points of hell as to go against the sentiment of the civilized
community or of Christian churches of to-day. If one at-
tempted to display towards criminals the feeling which
Christ had for those who persecuted him, men did not un-
derstand it. They said, “O, that wont do; that's too.
thin.” They call it sentimentalism and “gush.”
This is especially appropriate when outrageous laws are
enacted merely to give a worthless individual something to
do, and when his doing is the undoing of our most zealous,
if not always the most discreet, workers in the field of re-
form. There are laws, nota ly the fugitive slave law,
which may better be broken than observed The Comstock
law is another
LIVINGSTON'S DIFFICULTY. 45.
WILL PUBLIC
OPINION PROTECT PUBLIC MORALSP
[We copy the following letter and extract from the Bostone
7%aveller of July 15, 1878.]
CoNCORD, NEw HAMPSHIRE, July, 1878.
EDITOR OF THE TRAVELLER: SIR : Enclosed is an ex-
tract of a letter from Hon. Edward Livingston to M. Du-
ponceau, on the question of penal enactments for what are
termed offences against public morals. It is ſound in
Charles Haven Hunt's Liſe of Edward Livingston, Apple-
ton's edition, page 289, and will be read with interest at
present, when so many citizens, women as well as men,
. are, or lately have been, suffering severe penalties for what
have been construed as offences against public decency and
morality. Probably the name of Edward Livingston, as
author of a “Code of Criminal Law and Procedure,” is
second to no American name.
Hoping you will be able to make room for the extract, I
am truly yours. PARKER PILLSBURY.
HON. EDWARD LIVINGSTON TO
M. DUPONCEAU.
.... I am in a difficulty, and as it is one arising out of a
question of jurisprudence, I know no one to whom I can
apply for assistance, with so sure a hope of relief, as from
you. t
In the revision of my criminal code, I have now under
consideration the chapter of offences against public morals.
This is intended to comprehend all that class which the
English jurists have vaguely designated as offences contra
benos mores, finding it much easier in this, as they do in
many other cases, to give a Latin phrase, which may mean
, anything, rather than a definition.
46 PEN, PULPTT AND PLATFORM.
I have serious thoughts of omitting it altogether, and
leaving the whole class of indecencies to the correction of
public opinion. I have been led to this inclination of mind
(for as yet I have formed no decision) from the examination
of the particular acts which in practice have been brought
under the purview of this branch of criminal jurisprudence.
In the absence of anything like principle or definition, I
was obliged to have recourse to not only precedent, but to
the books of precedents; and they strongly reminded me
of some forms which I have seen in Catholic church books,
of questions which are to be put to the penitent by the pro-
essor, in which every abomination that could enter into
the imagination of a monk is detailed, in order to keep the
mind of a girl of fifteen free from pollution 1
Turn to any indictment of this kind in the books, for
the publication of obscene books or prints, or for indecency
of behavior, and you will find the innuendoes and exposition
of the offence infinitely more indecorous, more open viola-
tion of decency, than any of the works they axe intended
to punish and repress.
The evidence must be of the same nature, and hundreds
will hear the trial who never would have seen the book or
print. This evil is inevitable, if such acts are punished
by law.
There is another evirof no less magnitude, arising from
the difficulty of defining the offence.
Use the general expression of the English law, and a
fanatic judge, with a like-minded jury, will bring every
harmless levity under the lash of the law.
Sculpture and painting will be banished for their nu-
dities; poetry for the warmth of its descriptions; and
music, if it excite any forbidden passion, will scarcely
escape.
On the whole, I am surrounded by difficulties. Help
REV. O. B. FROTHINGHAMPS DISCOURSE. 47
me to a definition that shall include what ought to be pun-
ished, and not give room for the abuse I have pointed out.
Let me know how I shall &ecently accuse and try a man
for indecency; or else fortify me in my opinion of letting
public opinion protect public morals,
THE GOOD SOLDIER.
THE REv. O. B. FROTHINGHAM in his discourse at the
Masonic Temple, lec. I5, '78, spoke of the good soldier in
a way which proves that he himself is entitled to the desig-
nation. The following report of the sermon we find in the
HERALD. If our space would permit we should be pleased
:o publish the sermon in full. But the following is suf-
ficient to show the drift of it:
It was not too late, he contended, to speak of persecu-
tions for opinion's sake when it is remembered that in
Massachusetts, the cradle of American liberty, a man (Ezra
H. Heywood) may be convicted and imprisoned for holding
his opinion and that in New York another (D. M. Bennett)
can be indicted on this account. Mr. Frothingham argued
that so far as final results were concerned it made no dif-
ference whether a man's opinions were true or the reverse.
If the opinion questioned be a true one all assaults upon
it will be absolutely vain, and the attack will recoil upon
him who made it; and if, on the other hand, the opinion
be not founded in truth no amount of advocacy, come from
whence it may, can suffice to prop it up. The champion of
erroneous ideas is ruined by the click of his own gun.
The Roman Emperor, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus—the
head of the civilized world in his day—was a man whose
elegant writings are among the Greek classics: a man of .
the kindest heart and sweetest sympathies, but also one of
indomitable will. Educated a Stoic, he was a woman in
nature, and had in essence anticipated some of the best
48 PEN, PULPIT AND PLATFORM.
precepts of Christianity, yet he was an opponent of the
faith of Christ. He had no respect for its superstitions,
and he liſted the mighty handſ of a Roman emperor against
it, whereby he has earned for himself the stigma of perse-
cutor. Yet he was as fully justified in his course as those
are justified who to-day persecute atheism, materialism and
the like. Ah! what a different sort of Christianity we
+might have had if Marcus Aurelius had adopted the Chris-
tian religion and inſused into it the nobleness, tenderness,
goodness of his own nature. Here Mr. Frothingham en-
deavored to show that as no man knows he is wholly right
in abstract ideas, so no one can be justified for persecuting
his brother on account of a mere difference of opinion.—
He asked if atheism, materialism, Nihilism were false, and
if the answer was in the affirmative, how could the asserter
of their falseness prove he was right 2 x * * * *
Mr. Frothingham adverted to a Congressional enactment
passed at the instance of a certain society for the suppres-
sion of crime, and he claimed that this enactment was whol-
ly inoperative and useless, excepting for the purposes of
persecution by some few fanatics and monomaniacs.
LIBERTY AND MORALITY.
THE REv. MoncURE. D. Conway delivered not long
ago in South Place Chapel, Finsbury, England, a discourse
on “Liberty and Morality” which happens at this time to
apply as forcibly to some things going on in this country as
to what was then transpiring in England. In this discourse
Mr. CoNWAY is taking the British Society for the Suppres-
sion of Vice to task for depriving MRs. BESANT of her
child and for imprisoning MR. TRUELove. In the course
of his remarks he says “that the original aim of the so-
ciety may have been really to suppress vice, but there is
REW. M. D. CONWAY'S DISCOURSE. 49
reason to fear a baser influence has been at work to de-
grade the association; the members are attitudinizing as
purifiers of society;” they must “keep up a show of ac-
tivity;” and more than all this, “there is money in it.”—
All of which unquestionably applies to our society here as
well as to that by the same name on the other side of the
Atlantic. We have not room for the whole discourse, but
the following are interesting paragraphs culled here and
there and arranged without any particular reference to the
order in which they were presented in the discourse :
This recent oppression has, if you allow me the expres-
sion, sneaked back; it has subtly complicated itself with
, the moral feeling of the community; it has hid its horns
under a white cowl of purity; it has masked itself as a
defender of virtue and suppressor of vice. By so doing
oppression of thought confesses that it cannot otherwise
succeed even in seizing here and there an exceptional
victim
The resuscitation of irresponsible power anywhere is
accompanied by a corresponding revival of old oppressions
generally. Vernacular Press Laws in India, Turkish al-
liances and attacks on free printing -at home, have all one
neck. If anyone had told me ten years ago that I should
some day have to defend freedom of thought and of the
press in this metropolis of civil liberty, I should have been .
as much surprised as if he had predicted that we should all
be hunting wolves out of Epping Forest. I should have
said to him: “Why, John Milton settled all that over two
hundred years ago. Do you mean to say that the time can
come again when a man can personally suffer for his hon-
est thought and its honest publication 1"
He would have been rash indeed had he predicted that
we should live to assemble in our free societies, hard by a
prison in which an innocent Freethinker languishes, and be-
6
*
50 PEN, PDLPIT AND PLATFORM.
side a court which robs a mother of her child because of
her metaphysics,
Freedom of thought were an empty name if it did not
carry with it the freedom that brings thought to bear upon
the social laws and customs founded on past and fettered
thought. “Unproductive thought is no thought at all.”—
The intellect is man's instrument for conforming society
and the world to reason and right; and to restrain its free
play among the moral and social superstitions of mankind
were like folding a living seed in wrappings of a mummy.
The judges of Athens put Socrates to death on the
ground that his opinions tended to corrupt the youth of
that city. The high Court of Jerusalem sentenced Jesus
to death on similar grounds. Practical Pilate asked:—
“What evil hath he done?”—but he got no answer. Jesus
had done no evil; he had only advanced opinions which
the majority considered subversive of the moral foundations
of society. And, in short, there is no persecution, no op-
pression cf conscience, no massacre in history which may
not be justified on the principle that you may punish a man
for the evils which may be imaginatively and prospectively
attributed to the influence of his opinions. Nay, all con-
temporary discussion of vital problems, and new ideas, are
thus placed at the mercy of nervous apprehensions.
Every idea must have its influence on morals; whether
that influence will be good or evil, cannot be determined
by any foresight, least of all by the prejudices of those who
do not hold that idea, who hate it, and have not impar-
tially studied its bearings. Many of the best books in the
world have been pronounced immoral and wicked in their
time, and after it; and if the average common place of any
period, as represented by judges that know only precedents,
and jurors instructed by them, be allowed to suppress all
thoughts and works that do not merely repeat the prevail-
REW. M. D. CONWAY'S DISCOURSE. 51
ing notions, all inquiry is at an end, all progress paralyzed.
Goethe, being once in Kiel, was invited to attend a meet-
ing called by some clergymen, for the suppression of ob-
scene literature. He attended, and proposed that they
should begin with the Bible. That ended the conference,
and it was never heard of again. And that will end all
these attempts to suppress books called immoral by pruri-
ent imaginations, just so soon as the same measure is me-
ted out to Freethinkers and Bible Societies. Edward
Truelove is in gaol, but justice sees Solomon by his side
and those who circulate Solomon ; and St. Paul also, and
Shakespeare, Bocaccio, Montaigne, Dean Swift, Smollett,
Goethe, and many other great men, who were not afraid to
write of the facts of nature ; nay, many naturalists and
physiologists of our time and country would be there with
him to day if equal justice were done. There is no differ-
<nce between the plain speech in many classic works and
in those which have been lately condemned as immoral,
and no difference is alleged between the motives with
which they are all published. The book may be very able
in one case, very poor in another, but the principle of free-
dom and right protect them equally.
Confutation by Truth is the only suppression of error.—
Persecution only fans it into strength by mingling with its
smoke the glow of martyrdom. In the present case, sev-
•eral poor pamphlets have been drawn out of their obscu-
rity and scattered broadcast through the land; and any
man of common-sense must have known that such would
have been the result of attempting their suppression.—
What, then, are we to infer concerning those who have in-
‘stituted these recent proceedings 2 Are we to suppose
they have not the common-sense to know that they would
increase enormously the circulation of the opinions they
Profess to abhor 7
52 PENP, PULPIT AND PLATFORM.
Lucifer began, mythologically, as a heavenly detective.
He was the lawyer retained by the gods for the suppression
of vice and, from long engaging in that business, he came
to love it. When he had nobody to accuse he was in dis-
tress, and went about accusing innocent people. So he
was called the Accuser. And then he fell lower still, and
went about tempting people to sin, in order that he might
prosecute them ; and then he was called Satan. That was
the course of the first Vice Society, and the end of its
attorney.
They who menace man's freedom of thought and speech
are tampering with something more powerful than gun-
powder. They who suppress by force even an erroneous
book honestly meant for human welfare, are justifying all
the crimes ever committed against human intelligence;
they are laying again the trains that have always ended in
revolution: and, right as it is to suppress books notori-
ously meant for corruption, and punish the vile who through
them seek selfish ends at cost of the public good, even that
is a task requiring the utmost care and wisdom. Better
that many base men and many bad books escape than that
one homest woman be robbed of her child by violence call-
ing itself law, or one honest man suffer the felon's chain
from the very hand provided for the protection of honesty.
THE VERY WIDEST DISTINCTION,
Says a writer in the BoSTON DAILY GLOBE of Jan. 16,
1878, is to be made between writings intended to debauch
the mind and incite to vice and those intended to produce
the opposite result by the dissemination of knowledge and
of sound ideas regarding the sexual nature. Classing the
two together is a monstrous misjudgment. The suppres-
sion of any sober, candid discussion of questions that con-
..T. C. LELAND'S SUGGESTION. 53
cern the well-being of society is not only mistaken as a
matter of policy, but it abridges the freedom of speech
and of the press which is guaranteed by the Constitution
of the country.
AN OBSCENITY GAGUE.
If we must have a censorship regulated by United States
Iaw, then let us have a standard a metrical measure, a con-
ductor's punch, a steam guage, or something that will in-
dicate to a liberal editor how much obscenity to the square
inch his literary boiler will bear. The Comstock knave is
more absolute than the ene who troubled Falstaff. We
must speak by the card and write in view of an obsceno-
meter. Wanted an inventor to construct one immediately.
Masurements and specifications may be taken from
Shakespe re, Byron, Burns, Tristram Shandy, Montaigne's
essays, Hudibras, Bishop Percy's collection of ancient bal-
lads, and last—but not least—from the Bible. These works
stan on our library shelves, access ble without restriction
to young and old of both sexes, and they can be ordered of
any publisher and sent to the address of any purchaser
through the mails. The Liberal writers of to-day will
readily submit to the average register of the amount of ob-
scenity in these works, and be perfectly certain of never
approching the limit. Even Mr. Heywood has never ex-
ceeded it. What the liberals claim is equal laws and fair
play for all sides. This is all we ask; and I hope the
1hinking people of the country will examine this question
thorou hly, and see if they cannot plant their feet firmly
upon the ground of impartial freedom of the United States
mals. There is a hard struggle impending over the ques-
tio , we are only at the beginning of it; and all hands had
better be prepared to throw the wight of their opinion and
54 PEN, PULPIT AND PLATFORM.
1
influence upon the right side of it.—[T. C. LELAND in the
TRUTH SEEKER.
REV. SIDNEY SMITH ON
ſ SOCIETIES FOR THE SUPPRESSION OF WICE.
WORDS FOR THE HOUR I
Three-quarters of a century ago Rev. Sidney Smith, who
knew something of human nature, thus graphically de-
picted the dangers to which such societies were liable:—
“It is hardly possible that a society for the suppression of
vice can ever be kept within the bounds of good sense and
moderation. If there are many members who have really
become so from a feeling of duty, there will nelessa ily be
some who enter the society to hide a bad character, and
others whose object is to recommend themselves to their
bett rs by a sedulous and bustling inquis tion into the im-
moralities of the public. The loudest and no siest sup-
porters will always carry it against the more prudent part
of the community; the most violent will be considered the
most moral; and those who see the absurdi y will, from
the fear of being thought to encourage vice, be reluctant to
oppose it. . . . . Beginning with the best intentions in
the world, such societies must in all probabilities degene-
rate into a receptacle for every species of title-tattle, im-
pertinence and malice. Men who trade in rat-catching
love to catch rats; the bug-de troyer seizes on his bug with
delight, and the suppressor is grat fied by finding his vice.
This last soon becomes a mere tradesman like the others;
none of them moralize, or lament that their respective evils
should exist in the world. The public feeling is swallowed
up in the pursuit of a daly occupation and in the display
of a technical skill.”
PLAIN, SENSIBLE WORDS. 55
FROM A WRITER
IN THE NEW YORK DAILY TRIBUNE.
WORDS well SPOKEN 1
Some one signing himself J. attended one of the annual
meetings of the “N. Y. Society for the Suppression of Vice,”
as assumed by the society, or for the “Manufacture of
Vice,” as Prof. RAWSON has charged, and he (J.) gives his
views as follows: “The good result they seek to obtain is
more apparent than real, and never can be permanently
successful unless the young mind can be made to realize
its own moral accountability and the penalty it will have
to undergo as a necessary consequence of wrong doing.”
He further says that—“there is little gain to be expected
in eliminating one particular form of vice when so many
others or other forms of the same temptation await them
at every turn of life's broad pathway. If,” he says, “the
principle of rectitude can be early instilled into our young
women—a high-minded, honest purpose, and an INTELLI-
&ENT KNOWLEDGE OF PHYSIOLOGICAL AND MORAL EVIL
with their attending penalties—they will be measurably
safe, and not otherwise.”
This is substantially the ground taken by THE METHo-
DIST in its article upon the postal law which forbids the cir-
culation of obscene books or pictures. Whatever may
be necessary in the way of clearing ou' un lean literature,
one fact is certain –that no hing is so well calculated to
eradicate the evil as to bring children up with a thorough
knowledge of themselves. To this end popular physio-
logical works are indispensable. It is therefore an evi-
dence of fatal indiscrimination when the agent of the So-
ciety prosecutes those who are forwarding, with earnest.
ness at d purity of purpose, this branch of reform.
56 PEN, PULPIT AND PLATFORM
A CENSOR WANTED.
In a brief presented to the Judiciary Committee of Con-
gress, DR. E. B. Foote, J.R., took ground in favor of a
Censor, if the law is to be unrepealed or unmodified DR.
Foote, JR., said: “In one respect our condition here in
America is even worse than in the most despotic countries
of Europe. In them there is a censorship of the press-
If the present postal laws must remain as they are, then
we earnestly implore that a censorship be established—a
board of examiners to whom publishers may submit all
works of a scientific nature before issuing them, and thus
avoid the annoyance, worry, expense and opprobrium of an
arrest under the obscene literature law, and the necessity
of submitting the final decision to a jury of doubtful
ability. It might be made a duty of certain high post-of-
fice officials to decide upon such matters—which they often
refuse to do at present, and whose decision now has no legal
weight, for it has even been ruled out as evidence by Judge
Clarke, of Boston.”
ANOTHER WRITER SUGGESTS A CENSOR.
As distasteful as the idea of having a censor is to the
American mind, many intelligent people think such an of-
ficial would be far pr. ferable to the present spy and decoy
system which seeks rather to entrap than to warn. A
writer in THE TRUTH SEEKER, signing himself ARTIST,
writes:
“Better, a thousand times, if all these impalpable ques-
tions of propriety of utterance are to become, in this freest
age and freest country of the world, matters for some sort
of criminal tribunal; better a thousand times e-tablish a
modified censorship of the press to accompany and soften
the horrors of the new Inquisition. We ought, at least, to
*
A. SPECIAL TRIBUNAL NEEDED. 57
have the protection of knowing beforehand whether what
we have written and desire to publish will be tolerated, or
whet ºr it will incur the penalties of the law, and consign
us to a dungeon. We ought, at least, to have the benefit
of a SE IEs of warnings, such as the most despotic govern-
ments give to the pub'ishers of obnoxious political matters.
We should have, indeed, some sort of special tribunal for
the trial of such questions—if they must be tried, instead
i.
of intrusting them, as all civilized countries have hitherto .
done, to the good sense of the community—a tribunal most
careſully constitu'ed of the highest experts in literature.
science, art, morals and reform. The very worst contri-
vance for the trial of such issues, will be the trial BY JURY.
To submit the highest inspirations of genius, and the most
daring investigations of science, and the boldest specula-
tions and tentatives of social reform to the blundering
average opinion. the real vulgarity, of common ignorance
and prejudice, would be the one thing needed to extinguish
genius, to frammel scientific investigation, and clog the
wheels o progress of the world.
“Several great questions are now agitating the minds of
men ; for example, whether moral results are best attained
by leg 1 repressions or by merely moral agencies—as in
th- temperan e movement; whether devices of science and
art for limiting the number of progeny are moral and ex-
p dient or immoral and inexpedient; whether more famili-
arity with the processes of nature, in respect to generation
especially, debauches the young mind or purifies it, etc.—
Of all these, and such questions, there is a progressive and
a retrogressive side. Upon all these questions the Com-
stockian legislation has taken a snap-judgment in behalf of
the conserva ive an i repressive side. Of course, that can-
not be the end of it. Of course, a reaction will .ake place,
on the side of progression, and the enlargement of liberty-
353 PEN, PCEPIT AND PLATFORM.
The long lines of battles which were fought in past ages
en the field of religious, and that of political freedom are
now to be renewed on the social and artistic fields. The
new crusade ſor liberty will have its martyrs, and it is to be
expected that some of those who should be its staunchest
defenders will show a genius for getting themselves planted
on the wrong side, as 14 seems to me was unfortunately to
be the case with our friends of the INDEx.
“This great subject is not yet even plainly-opened to the
public. Artists, men of science, and reformers, are, as yet,
scarcely aware of the existence, much less of the reach, of
the new legislation, It constitutes a real and formidable
danger for every one of them, or for some among them.—
There has been always, for example, a sharp conflict, lite-
rary and moralistic, over the question of THE NUDE in art.
All bold art-instincts have been, in favor of it. Real art is
impossible without it. Puritanism is opposed to it. Forty
years ago when Powers' Greek Slave, and other similar
works, were first exhibited in this country, puritanism took
the alarm, and made a staunch fight over the subject; and
was, definitively, as it was supposed. defeated. The art-
instinct triumphed. Since that time not a murmur has been
heard of objection to the usages of high art. At the Cen-
tennial Exposition, at Philadelphia, nude nature was ex-
hibited nearly as freely as it would have been in any capi-
tal in Europe, and not even an objecting comment was
made in any quarer. But at that very time, Mr. Comstock
| ad surreptitiously, that is to say, quietly and unobservedly,
obtained at Washington, the passage of laws, nominally
relating to obscenity, under which many of the artists and
importers of works of art at the great national exposition
could have been consigned to prison; for beyond question
a vulgar-minded jury could have been readily found whose
THE WOICE OF PRESIDENT HAYES. 59.
verdict would have declared many of the pictures and much.
of the statuary there to have been INDECENT ..."
TOO MUCH MEDDLING.
The PopULAR SCIENCE Monthly ſor August, in an ar-
ticle on “Criminal Justice in 1876,” remarks that “a very
powerful cause of the inefficient execution of justice in so-
ciety is, hat government perpetually forgets its supreme
functions, in the pursuit of other ends. It a tempts to do
so many things that it does nothing well, and sacrifices the
very object for which it was instituted in the attempt to
accomplish others which it had no business to under take.
Instead of confining itself vigorously to the establishment
of justice in all relations of society,” remarks this writer,
“and then allowing the widest liberty of individual action
and enterprise, it meddles with everything and ever body
—interſering, checking and restraining where it should let
things alone ; and undertaking to play the part of Provi-
dence in controlling the whole course of human interests.
Justice is thus not only neglected, but injustice is wrought
in all directions; so that government at last becomes the
instrument and partner of the great agencies of oppression.
and wrong-doing in society.”
THE VOICE OF PRESIDENT HAYES.
We wonder if PRESIDENT HAYES did not have the sup-
pressive postal laws in mind when in his annual message
for 1878 he said: “The protection of liberty requires the
maintenance in full vigºr of the manly methods of free
speech, free press a d free suffrage.”
Whether he did or not, the true principle is enunciated
in no mistakable terms which have especial value at this
time.
60 PEN, PULPIT AND PLATFORM.
OVER-LEGISLATION.
Mr. ISAAc H. BroMLEY, in :ture in the month of May,
1876, before the Kent Club, oſthe Yale Law School, on
“Over-legislation,” made some note-worthy remarks. He
thought we ought to have a Law REPEALING Assembly
alternating with the Legislature, who e ſunct on should
be confined to repealing laws :
“The general truth,” says Bromley, “traceable through
all history, the final outcome of all he efforts of mankind
to accomplish social progres or establish morality and vir-
tue by legal enactments, is that whenever men have un-
dertaken to lay upon society the duties, privileges and re-
sponsibilities belonging to the individual, them and there
they have done work for some one's undoing b -and- y.—
It is as plain in the work of your last year's Legislature,
or your last Congress, as it was eighteen centuries ago,
when the Founder of a New Dispensation swept away the
accumulated rubbish and litter of forms and ceremonies,
traditions and laws, that had grown out of ages of effort
to legislate righteousness, and establish in their lac - he
law of individual responsibility. * * * * The worst
tyranny is always that whose mainspring is in conscien-
tious conviction ; it is rarely entirely brutal, or even selfish.
They who piled the fagots, or builded the scaffold's where
martyrs have made suffering and death glorious, were jur
as conscientious and sincere in what they deemed their duty
as they who stowd in the flames or under the beam.”
CONCT, UDING WORDS.
With MR. BROMLEY's significant and, for the present pur-
pose, peculiarly appropria e remarks we rest our case.—
While an intelligent censorship of the press, as suggested
by two writers, is far preferable to the present ignorant cen-
sorship, which has nothing to do with warnings and every-
DOWN WITH COMSTOC, 61
thing to do with penalties, we think the weight of opinion
is in favor of the repe all “Comstock laws,” state or
national, and return º: for the suppression
of obscene literature as the wisdom of our law-makers
rather than the low cunning of unprincipled detectives may
devise. To this end we wish that Auxiliary Defense As-
sociations might be formed in every considerable city in the
Union for the purpose of defending the innocent victims of
the Inquisition, and of laboring by petitioning and other-
wise to wipe from the statute books the infamous legisla-
tion which gives it foot-hold on American soil. And
as this is the sentiment of the NEw York NATIONAL DE-
FENSE ASSOCIATION and its supporters, having no connec-
tion whatever with either the Free Religious Association,
or with the National Liberal Leagues, let no REv. Joseph
Cook, or any other man, place it in the mouths of any
other organizations than this one from which it emanates
boldly and unqualifiedly. Our Banner is unfurled with the
motto—“DOWN WITH COMSTOcKISM"—the enemy of a
free Republic—and we invite all Christian people of every
denomination, and good people of every belief or unbelief
who have the good of the human family at heart, to rally
under it. There is no sectarianism in our creed, and only
one final object in view. This we state too definitely to
be misunderstood.

—-º-º-º-º-º-º-
BOSTON DEFENSE ASSOCIATION.
At Boston, on the 5th of Jan., 1879, an association was
formed auxiliary to the Nat onal Defense Association, of
N. Y., whose object is to defend all persons unjustly prose-
cuted by Anthony Comstock and the Society for the Sup.
pression of Vice. The following officers were elected:—
President, Mrs. Laura Kendrick : Vice-President, Moses
Hull; Sec'ry, Mrs. Mattie Sawyer; Treas., J. S. Ver ty;
Executive Committee, Frank Rivers, J. Flora Tilton,
Benjamin R. Tucker, J. H. W. Tochey, A. R. Spinney.
PESARIENDs O F

Free Mails, e PreSS
AND FRE EECH.
DO NOT FAIL TO SEND AT LEAST $1
To the National Defense Association!
ExTRACTS FROM THE CONSTITUTION OF THIS ASSOCIATION.
ARTICLE II--The objects of this Association are:
To investigate all questionable cases of prosecution
under what are known as the Comstock laws, State and
National, and to extend sympathy, moral support and
material aid to those who may be unjustly assailed by
the enemies of free speech and free press.
To rescue those who may be convicted and imprisoned
for no other crime than exercising the natural right ;
an American citizen, to think his thoughts and expres
them orally or in print.

To defend honest investigators in all departments of
science, and to uphold the rights of the people to acquire
a thorough knowledge of human physiology.
Finally to employ all peaceful and honorable means
to roll back the wave of intolerance, bigotry and igno-
#. which threatens to submerge our cherished
iberties.
ARTICLE III.-Any friend of the cause may become an
active member of this association by the payment into
its treasury of the sum of Ten Dollars ($10.00), but the
payment of One Dollar ($1.00) shaāl entitle the donor to
a certificate of honorary membership, for the period of
one year, and to a report from the officers of this Assº;
ciation of its receipts, disbursements and transactions.
THE OFFICERS ARE A. L. RAwson, D.D. L.L.D., Presi-
dent; JoHN P, JEwBTT, Esq., Vice-President; E. B.
Foot E, Jr., M. D., Secretary; G. L. HENDERson, Esq.,
No. 141 Eighth street, Now York, Treasurer.
ExECUTIVE CoMMITTEE : T. C. LELAND. Esq., 201 East
71st St., N. Y., Chairman; HUGH By Ron BRow N ; WIL-
son McD2NALD ; CHs. WINTERBURN, M. D.; CHs. Cop-
WIAN.