The Gathings Committee: Censorship, Society, and Paperback Literature

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In 1952, Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn appointed Arkansas Democrat Representative Ezekiel Candler "Took" Gathings to lead a select committee and investigate the potential effect of allegedly obscene literature on the morals of American society. The House Select Committee on Current Pornographic Materials, informally known as the Gathings Committee, issued a majority report in 1953. It claimed the distribution of obscene literature was a pervasive problem, and recommended the federal government censor the distribution of material deemed inappropriate. Ultimately, the House of Representatives discarded the committee's recommendations. However, questions of whether or not literature could affect social morals, or if censorship was needed to protect social norms, prevailed into subsequent decades. The purpose of this study is to examine how constituents viewed the committee's efforts.