Obscenity Report, illustrated
Feb 28th, 2013 by houghtonmodern
This post is part of an ongoing series featuring items from the newly acquired Julio Mario Santo Domingo collection.
The illustrated presidential report of the Commission on Obscenity and Pornography is the product of curious historical circumstance. Authorized by Congress to investigate the validity of obscenity laws in 1967, during Lyndon Johnson’s presidency, the Commission’s work extended through the Vietnam War and Richard Nixon’s election, events which greatly diminished the Commission’s governmental favor. When the report was finally released in 1970, it was fractured in two: a majority report recommending that anti-obscenity laws be struck down, and a dissenting minority report that expressed the views of the reigning Republican Party. The majority report was censured by the Senate, discredited by Nixon, and apparently doomed to immediate obscurity, until a copy found its way into the hands of William Hamling and Earl Kemp of the erotic publishing house Greenleaf Classics.
Hamling and Kemp rereleased the report, illustrating it with hundreds of explicit pornographic images – images similar to those the Commission had used for evidence in its research. While initial sales were predictably brisk, the unauthorized publication soon came to the President’s attention, and Hamling and Kemp were indicted on obscenity charges and ordered to sell Greenleaf. As a result, the illustrated report is relatively rare, but copies such as this one, inscribed by Kemp to Julio Santo Domingo, do survive the political tumult of their creation. The volume’s illustrations, captioned with excerpts from the text, are an exhaustive survey of sexual imagery in American culture, juxtaposed against the report’s survey results, legislative recommendations, and general commentary. The pages seen here are among the few suitable to reproduce in this space.
The illustrated presidential report… San Diego: Greenleaf Classics, 1970. HOU-LC HQ471 C65 1971x.
Thanks to rare book cataloger Ryan Wheeler for contributing this post.
I don’t remember Julio but I do remember most of the rest of it. A delight and a surprise to find this copy in the Haughton Library, Harvard University.
Carry on….
Earl Kemp
I just sent a comment but apparently it didn’t get through to you. I’m delighted and surprised to find this copy of ILLUSTRATED in the Houghton Library, Harvard. Also I don’t remember Julio but I sure remember the rest of it….
Carry On!
Earl Kemp
Anyone interested in obtaining a copy?
Nick, if you have a copy, I’m interested in buying! Corbin@bobmizer.org.