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A Matter of National Concern

Curiously enough, the majority of the Commission on Obscenity

and Pornography found that the traffic in obscenity and pornography was not a matter of national concern. As a matter of fact, they went

further in their Report, making several patently erroneous, gratuitiously

insulting remarks:

Discussions of obscenity and pornography in the past have
often been devoid of fact. Popular rhetoric has often
contained a variety of estimates of the size of the smut
industry and assertions regarding the consequences of
the existence of these materials and exposure to them.
Many of the se statements, however, have had little
anchoring in objective evidence.

And again:

itself.

When the Commission undertook its work, it could find
no satisfactory estimates of the volume of traffic in
obscene and pornographic materials. Documented
evidence describing the content of materials included
therein were not available. (Underscoring mine.)

Contradicting the Commission is the language of Public Law 90-100

Also, for at least the last five sessions, practically all legislatures of the fifty states have considered and in most cases acted upon some form of legislation aimed at tightening their obscenity laws.

There are some 200 bills currently pending before the Congress

of the United States to deal more strictly and more effectively with the pornographers.

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The Congress of the United States has established a long record documented in the Congressional Record, various Government Printing Office publications, and the Library of Congress the national concern with obscenity and pornography. The first serious investigation brought before a Congressional Committee were the 1952 hearings instituted by Congressman Ezekiel Gathings. Gathings' investigations have been followed to the present time in almost unbroken succession by various Committees and Subcommittees of both the House of Representatives and the Senate. Included among others were the efforts of Kathryn Granahan, Senators Kefauver, Dodd, and Mundt, and Congressman Dominick Daniels. The most cursory reading of these readily available studies and hearings belies the Commission statements. Literally thousands upon thousands of pages of testimony of well-qualified experts estimate the size of the smut industry and detail the consequences of the existence of the materials and exposure to them. Well-laden with facts and firmly anchored in objective evidence as well as being copiously documented with descriptions of the content of the materials involved, these Congressional hearings provide an absolute gold mine of information for anyone even remotely acquainted with the problem, with the national concern, and looking for an objective evaluation

of the situation.

I testified before several of these Committees over a period of years; I have heard many others testify, including men of outstanding reputation and impeccable qualifications. The general theme developed

from all the foregoing studies and investigations is that freedom for obscenity is death for morality and that such a condition would result in the enslavement of our society. Such a theme is diametrically opposed to the preconceived conclusions of the Commission majority who are dedicated to a position of complete moral anarchy and is obviously the reason the studies were so completely ignored.

It is said that the Congress of the United States, almost more

than any governmental body in history, reflects the will of the people

of the United States. Does the conclusion of "non concern" by the Commission
majority square with the following fact: Even though the United States
Senate knew that the Commission Report was to be made public
September 30, 1970, and that the Report would recommend a "soft-line"
approach to commercial obscenity, the Senate on September 25, 1970,
nevertheless, approved by a unanimous vote of 79-to-0 a bill that would
sharply curtail the amount of obscene advertising that pours into American
homes through the United States mail.

On August 22, 1970, the Attorney General spoke out strongly against
the pornographers, reiterating the pledge of the Nixon Administration to
"open a new front against filth peddlers..." and promised prompt and per-
sistent action to stop the pornographers.

On September 25, 1970, the Vice President of the United States stated the national "need to restrain bad taste and outrageous vulgarity."

Publications over the past several years and today, whether they

be in the field of general news, such as "Time", "Life", and "Newsweek",

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etc., or in the more technical field, such as the "Newsletter of Research

Institute Recommendations", or trade publications of various industrial
associations or in magazines of communities, such as "The Cincinnati
Magazine" or "Phoenix", all have concerned and do concern themselves
with the glut of smut in America as a timely subject.

Most of all, the national concern with obscenity is reflected in the
increasing concern of some of the finest people in our nation. I refer
specifically to men like Ray Gauer and Jim Clancy of Los Angeles, Bill
Pfender of Philadelphia, Dick Bertsch of Cleveland, and Al Johnston of
Biloxi. These gentlemen take of their time and their fortunes to participate
daily in the battle against the pornographers. They are representative of
countless Americans who, awakening to the most serious threat to public
decency in history are increasingly becoming aware and active. I suggest
the majority members of the Commission ought to communicate more with their
fellow Americans. As I inferred earlier in this Report, it is too bad the

majority of the Commission are not responsible to the voters.
they would soon feel the brunt of national concern for decency.
The Panel Reports

If they were,

I will devote the remaining portion of my dissent to comments on the four Panel Reports. It is again necessary to remind the reader that, for all practical purposes, the Panel Reports in their final form were not available for the preparation of this dissent and, therefore, my discussion is not able to be the specific rebuttal which I would have preferred; however, there is ample material to discuss.

Traffic and Distribution of

Obscene and Pornographic Material

The Eden Theatre is located in East Greenwich Village.

This is

a sleazy, disreputable part of New York. The Theatre is old and
dilapidated. "Oh! Calcutta!" plays at the Eden Theatre. "Oh! Calcutta!"
is pure pornography--a two-hour orgy, principally enacted in the nude.

It is not possible to verbally depict the depravity, deviation, eroticism,
or the utter filth of the play. Male and female players fondle each other,
commit or simulate intercourse, sodomy, cunnilingus, masturabation,
sadism, ad nauseam. This abomination, at the time I write this Report,
is proposed to be televised live or by video-tape across the nation via
lines of American Telephone and Telegraph and various telephonic com-
munications systems. Never in Rome, Greece, or the most debauched
nation in history has such utter filth been projected to all parts of a nation.
If there is or ever was any such thing as public decency, these actions offend

it.

If there is or ever was a constitutional prerogative of the American people to have the exercise of police power in the interests of the public health and welfare, this is it.

On September 17, 1970, a fur farmer in upper New York wrote me regarding migrant Puerto Rican and American Indian workers whom he has employed over the past twenty years. The gentleman advised: "There has been a big change in our workers in the last year or two. " He stated that they have changed from rather manly, decent people to rapists

"' he said,

being obsessed with sex, including many deviations. "I believe,
"this is mostly due to obscene literature and obscene pictures such as

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