The Laws of Obscene Libel.

We come now to a subject that is highly controversial, one that has, in fact, been more hotly disputed than any other concerning the restrictions on freedom of expression. It is an interesting fact that State concern with obscene matter in print, and its possible effect on people's minds, is of fairly recent origin. There were no laws of Obscene Libel in Shakespeare's, or even in Bunyan's or Swift's day. The earliest prosecutions for obscene libels occurred in the 18th century, and were directed against works that were held to threaten religion, "that great basis of civil government and society", and so cause a breach of the peace. During the 19th century, however, the emphasis was shifted, by two important judgments and an Act of Parliament, from the social (the objective) to the individual (the subjective). The first judgment was that of Lord Campbell which resulted in the Obscene Publications Act of 1857. Campbell gave an assurance that this measure was "intended to apply exclusively to works written for the single purpose of corrupting the morals of youth and of a nature calculated to shock the common feelings of decency in any well-regulated mind". The Act, therefore, was aimed at pornography, if pornography be defined as the production of works whose main purpose is to excite sexual passion. Against such an Act serious literature could have little complaint because it could never have a purpose of this kind, and hence would be immune from prosecution and prohibition. Unfortunately, it was succeeded in 1838 by the Cockburn judgment which laid down the test of obscenity as "whether the tendency of the matter charged... is to deprave and corrupt those whose minds are open to such immoral influences and into whose hands a publication of this sort may fall". As a result of this and one later interpretation, reference to the purpose of the author or publisher became irrelevant to the question whether a publication was obscene. It was henceforth simply a question of the possible effect on susceptible minds. It is this definition of obscenity that is applied in English law today.