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Anthony Comstock

 
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Anthony Comstock (March 7, 1844 – September 21, 1915) was a former United States Postal Inspector
United States Postal Inspection Service

The United States Postal Inspection Service is the law enforcement arm of the United States Postal Service. Its jurisdiction is defined as "crimes that may adversely affect or mail fraud use the U.S....
 and politician dedicated to ideas of Victorian morality
Victorian morality

Victorian morality is a distillation of the morality views of people living at the time of Victoria of the United Kingdom in particular, and to the moral climate of Great Britain throughout the 19th century in general that were in stark contrast to the morality of the previous Georgian period....
.

Biography
He was born in New Canaan, Connecticut
New Canaan, Connecticut

New Canaan is a New England town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, Connecticut, United States, 8 miles northeast of Stamford, Connecticut, on the Five Mile River....
. As a young man, he enlisted and fought for the Union in the American Civil War
American Civil War

The American Civil War , also known as the War Between the States and several Naming the American Civil War, was a civil war in the United States....
 from 1863 to 1865 in Company H, 17th Connecticut Infantry.






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Anthony Comstock
Anthony Comstock (March 7, 1844 – September 21, 1915) was a former United States Postal Inspector
United States Postal Inspection Service

The United States Postal Inspection Service is the law enforcement arm of the United States Postal Service. Its jurisdiction is defined as "crimes that may adversely affect or mail fraud use the U.S....
 and politician dedicated to ideas of Victorian morality
Victorian morality

Victorian morality is a distillation of the morality views of people living at the time of Victoria of the United Kingdom in particular, and to the moral climate of Great Britain throughout the 19th century in general that were in stark contrast to the morality of the previous Georgian period....
.

Biography


He was born in New Canaan, Connecticut
New Canaan, Connecticut

New Canaan is a New England town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, Connecticut, United States, 8 miles northeast of Stamford, Connecticut, on the Five Mile River....
. As a young man, he enlisted and fought for the Union in the American Civil War
American Civil War

The American Civil War , also known as the War Between the States and several Naming the American Civil War, was a civil war in the United States....
 from 1863 to 1865 in Company H, 17th Connecticut Infantry. He served without incident, but objected to the profanity used by his fellow soldiers. Afterward he became an active worker in the Young Men's Christian Association
YMCA

The Young Men's Christian Association was founded on June 6, 1844 in London, United Kingdom, by George Williams . The original intention of the organization was to put Christian principles into practice....
 in New York City
New York City

The City of New York is the List of United States cities by population in the United States, while the New York metropolitan area ranks among the List of urban areas by population....
.

In 1873 Comstock created the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice
New York Society for the Suppression of Vice

The New York Society for the Suppression of Vice was founded in 1873 by Anthony Comstock and his supporters in the Young Men's Christian Association....
, an institution dedicated to supervising the morality
Morality

Morality has three principal meanings.In its first, descriptive usage, morality means a code of conduct which is held to be authoritative in matters of right and wrong....
 of the public. Later that year, Comstock successfully influenced the United States Congress
United States Congress

The United States Congress is the Bicameralism legislature of the Federal government of the United States of the United States of America, consisting of two houses, the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives....
 to pass the Comstock Law
Comstock Law

The Comstock Act, was a United States federal law which made it illegal to send any "obscene, lewd, and/or lascivious" materials through the mail, including contraceptive devices and information....
, which made illegal the delivery or transportation of both "obscene, lewd, or lascivious" material as well as any methods of, or information pertaining to, birth control
Birth control

Birth control, sometimes synonymous with contraception, is a regimen of one or more actions, devices, or medications followed in order to deliberately prevent or reduce the likelihood of pregnancy or childbirth....
. George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw, was an Irish people playwright.Although Shaw's first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, his talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60 plays....
 coined the term "comstockery", meaning "censorship because of perceived obscenity or immorality", after Comstock alerted the New York police to the content of Shaw's play Mrs. Warren's Profession
Mrs. Warren's Profession

Mrs Warren's Profession is a Play written by George Bernard Shaw in 1893. The story centers on the relationship between Mrs Warren, a prostitute, described by Shaw as "on the whole, a genial and fairly presentable old blackguard of a woman," and her "prudish" daughter, Vivie....
. Shaw remarked that "Comstockery is the world's standing joke at the expense of the United States. Europe likes to hear of such things. It confirms the deep-seated conviction of the Old World that America is a provincial place, a second-rate country-town civilization after all." Comstock thought of Shaw as an "Irish smut dealer".

Comstock's ideas of what might be "obscene, lewd, or lascivious" were quite broad. During his time of greatest power, even some anatomy
Anatomy

Anatomy is a branch of biology that is the consideration of the body plan. It is a general term that includes human anatomy, animal anatomy and plant anatomy ....
 textbook
Textbook

A textbook is a manual of instruction or a standard book in any branch of study. They are produced according to the demand of educational institutions....
s were prohibited from being sent to medical students by the United States Postal Service
United States Postal Service

The United States Postal Service is an Independent agencies of the United States government responsible for providing postal service in the United States....
.

Leedscomstock
Comstock aroused intense loathing from early civil liberties groups and intense support from church based groups worried about public morals. He was a savvy political insider in New York City
New York City

The City of New York is the List of United States cities by population in the United States, while the New York metropolitan area ranks among the List of urban areas by population....
 and was made a special agent of the United States Postal Service
United States Postal Service

The United States Postal Service is an Independent agencies of the United States government responsible for providing postal service in the United States....
, with police powers up to and including the right to carry a weapon. With this power he zealously prosecuted those he suspected of either public distribution of pornography
Pornography

Pornography or porn is the explicit depiction of sexual subject matter with the sole intention of sexually exciting the viewer. It is to a certain extent similar to erotica, which is the use of sexually arousing imagery....
 or commercial fraud
Fraud

In the broadest sense, a fraud is a deception made for personal gain or to damage another individual. The specific legal definition varies by legal jurisdiction....
. He was also involved in shutting down the Louisiana Lottery
Louisiana State Lottery Company

The Louisiana State Lottery Company was a private corporation that in the mid-19th century ran the Louisiana lottery. It was for a time the only legal lottery in the United States, and for much of that time had a very foul reputation as a Confidence trick of the state and citizens and a repository of political corruption....
, the only legal lottery in the United States
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
 at the time, and notorious for corruption.

Comstock is also known for his opposition to Victoria Woodhull
Victoria Woodhull

Victoria Claflin Woodhull was an United States Suffragette who was described by Gilded Age newspapers as a leader of the American woman's suffrage movement in the 19th century....
 and Tennessee Claflin, and those associated with them. The men's journal The Days' Doings had popularised lewd images of the sisters for three years and was instructed by its editor (while Comstock was present) to stop producing images of "lewd character". Comstock also took legal action against the paper for advertising contraceptives. When the sisters published an expose of an adulterous affair between Reverend Henry Ward Beecher
Henry Ward Beecher

Henry Ward Beecher was a prominent, Congregational church clergyman, social reformer, abolitionist, and Orator in the mid to late 19th century....
 and Elizabeth Tilton, he had the sisters arrested under laws forbidding the use of the postal service to distribute 'obscene material'—specifically (and ironically) citing a mangled Biblical quote Comstock found obscene—though they were later acquitted of the charges.

Less fortunate was Ida Craddock
Ida Craddock

Ida C. Craddock was a 19th century American advocate of free speech and women's rights.Born in Philadelphia, her Minister father died when she was two years old....
, who committed suicide on the eve of reporting to Federal prison for distributing via the U.S. Mail various sexually explicit marriage manuals she had authored. Her final work was a lengthy public suicide note specifically condemning Comstock.

Comstock claimed he drove fifteen persons to suicide in his "fight for the young". He was head vice-hunter of the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice
New York Society for the Suppression of Vice

The New York Society for the Suppression of Vice was founded in 1873 by Anthony Comstock and his supporters in the Young Men's Christian Association....
. Comstock, the self-labeled "weeder in God's garden", arrested D. M. Bennett for publishing his "An Open Letter to Jesus Christ" and later entrapped the editor for mailing a free-love pamphlet. Bennett was prosecuted, subjected to a widely publicized trial, and imprisoned in the Albany Penitentiary.

Comstock had numerous enemies, and in later years his health was affected by a severe blow to the head from an anonymous attacker. He lectured to college audiences and wrote newspaper articles to sustain his causes. Before his death, Comstock attracted the interest of a young law student, J. Edgar Hoover
J. Edgar Hoover

John Edgar Hoover , generally known as J. Edgar Hoover, was the first Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the United States....
, interested in his causes and methods.

During his career, Comstock clashed with Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman

Emma Goldman was an anarchism known for her political activism, writing and speeches. She played a pivotal role in the development of anarchist political philosophy in North America and Europe in the first half of the twentieth century....
 and Margaret Sanger
Margaret Sanger

Margaret Higgins Sanger was an United States birth control activist, an advocate of eugenics#Meanings and types of eugenics, and the founder of the American Birth Control League ....
. In her autobiography, Goldman referred to Comstock as the leader of America's "moral eunuch
Eunuch

A eunuch is a castrated man, in particular one castrated early enough to have major hormonal consequences; the term usually refers to those castrated in order to perform a specific social function, as was common in many societies of the past....
s". Through his various campaigns, he destroyed 15 tons of books, 284,000 pounds of plates for printing 'objectionable' books, and nearly 4,000,000 pictures. Comstock boasted that he was responsible for 4,000 arrests and 15 suicides.

A biography of Comstock written in 1927, "Anthony Comstock: Roundsman Of The Lord" by Heywood Broun
Heywood Broun

Heywood Campbell Broun // was an United States journalist. He worked as a sportswriting, newspaper columnist, and editing in New York City. He founded the American Newspaper Guild, now known as The Newspaper Guild....
 and Margaret Leech
Margaret Leech

Margaret Kernochan Leech also known as Margaret Pulitzer, was an American author and historian, who won two Pulitzer Prizes in Pulitzer Prize for History, for her books Reveille in Washington and In the Days of McKinley ....
 of the Algonquin Round Table
Algonquin Round Table

The Algonquin Round Table was a celebrated group of New York City writers, critics, actors and wits. Gathering initially as part of a practical joke, members of "The Vicious Circle," as they dubbed themselves, gathered for lunch each day at the Algonquin Hotel from 1919 until roughly 1929....
 examines his personal history and his investigative, surveillance and law enforcement techniques.

Works

  • Frauds Exposed (1880)
  • Traps for the Young (1883)
  • Gambling Outrages (1887)
  • Morals Versus Art (1887)


He wrote numerous magazine articles relating to similar subjects.

Contemporary Bibliography

  • Anna Bates: Weeder in the Garden of the Lord: Anthony Comstock's Life and Career: Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America: 1995: ISBN 076180076X


  • Nicola Beisel: Imperiled Innocents: Anthony Comstock and Family Reproduction in Victorian America: Princeton: Princeton University Press: 1997: ISBN 069102779X


  • Helen Horowitz: Rereading Sex: Battles over Sexual Knowledge and Suppression in Nineteenth Century America: New York: Knopf: 2002: ISBN 037540192X


See also

  • Comstock Act
  • New York Society for the Suppression of Vice
    New York Society for the Suppression of Vice

    The New York Society for the Suppression of Vice was founded in 1873 by Anthony Comstock and his supporters in the Young Men's Christian Association....


External links