Changes

The Comstock Act (1873), or the “Act of the Suppression of Trade in, and Circulation of, Obscene Literature and Articles of Immoral Use” was a statute designed to make the transmission of “obscene material” by mail a crime. The Act had far-reaching implications for Americans during the time it was enacted (mostly through the 1930s, but some remnants of the Act remained until much later). The Act, which is named after its primary champion and architect Anthony Comstock, marks an important attempt to regulate American behavior at a time when society was rapidly changing.