While the right to the freedoms of speech and expression is one that is highly prized by many throughout the world and is certainly considered a founding precept of the United States, the actual use and protection of that right has varied greatly throughout history. Because human beings live in a complicated social web in which interaction is all but unavoidable, the speech of one person cannot help but have an effect upon another. It is for that reason that censorship, meaning the suppression of speech or the destruction of communicative material deemed harmful or inappropriate, has existed for nearly as long as communication itself has existed. The justifications for censorship are typically twofold: to protect a society from moral corruption or to quash subversive ideas that could harm a political regime. In the name of either one or both of these causes, censorship has been used as a powerful tool throughout history to limit the freedom of speech and expression and will likely continue as communication’s constant companion.

Censorship in the Ancient World

While books and other pieces of literature have been destroyed by accident or as an act of war throughout recorded history, one of the earliest acts of state-sponsored censorship conducted for the “supposed” common good of the people came in 399 B.C. with the execution of Socrates. Philosopher and teacher in ancient Greece, Socrates was charged with corrupting the youth of Athens with his controversial teaching methods and drawing them away from the Greek religion. Sentenced to death for his actions, he was forced to drink a poisonous liquid containing hemlock (Baez 2008).

The Greek philosopher Plato was one of the earliest advocates of censorship, especially when used to protect the innocence of youth

Interestingly, one of Socrates’ students, the Greek philosopher Plato, became a leading advocate for censorship after his teacher’s death. In his philosophical treatise The Republic, Plato advocated the strict censorship of literary materials for children, arguing that early exposure to fiction can cause children to overly identify with fictional characters and subsequently emulate their worst characteristics. Thus, Plato contended that it was society’s moral obligation to exercise control over everything children see, hear, or read (Heins 2001). This theme of guardianship over the innocence of youth is one that has been repeatedly espoused by advocates of censorship even up to the modern day.

State-sponsored censorship, thus begun in Greece, traveled quickly throughout the ancient world. In China, the emperor Qin Shi Huang ordered the burning of all books except those that dealt with agriculture, medicine, or prophecy in 213 B.C. in order to protect his newly united empire from the perceived dangers of poetry, history, and philosophy (Baez 2008). Included in this burning were many of the writings of Confucius, a Chinese scholar and philosopher whom Qin Shi Huang disdained and feared for his vindication of ancestor worship and his knowledge of history and politics. While some writings of Confucius were saved by librarians and others who recognized their value, countless others were destroyed.

In the ancient Roman Empire, censorship became an increasingly official duty, and it is there that the word “censor” was first introduced. The title of censor was given to a public official in the Roman government, and the office existed from 443 to 22 B.C. (Coetzee 1996). Coming from the Latin word censere—meaning to appraise, value, or judge—the chief job of the censor in Rome was to keep an accurate count, or census, of the citizens of Rome. Also listed with the censor’s duties, however, was the regulation and supervision of public morality. In the duties of this office, Roman censors (also known as castigatores or chastisers) had the power to determine if the actions of an individual were cause for degradation in citizenship or rank, regardless of the legality of such actions.

Actions that could be punished by the censor included continuing to live in celibacy when marriage and reproduction were more in the interest of the state, neglect in caring for one’s fields, and working in a disreputable trade or occupation (such as acting in the theater) (ibid). The censor could issue a variety of punishments depending on the transgression committed, and his power to censor and punish actions deemed immoral inspired both reverence and fear among the citizens of Rome. While the office of censor was eventually abolished from the Roman government, the idea that it was the obligation of the state to set standards for public morality would persist throughout history.

Censorship and Christianity

Censorship and the guardianship of public morality were certainly important to many civilizations prior to the advent of Christianity, but they became all the more important once a Christian orthodoxy was established in Europe during the early centuries of the first millennium. Fears against heresy and subversive literature against the official doctrine were evident as early as A.D. 325, the year of the first Nicene Creed, a document which firmly laid out the beliefs of Catholic Christianity and tolerated no discrepant viewpoints (ibid). However, as more and more books arguing the premises of Christianity were written, copied, and disseminated, censorship became even more rigid and the punishments for heresy even more extreme.

With the advent of the printing press in fifteenth-century Europe and the rise of the Protestant Reformation, the written works of “heretics” like Martin Luther were deemed quite dangerous to the public. In response to Martin Luther and others, the Roman Catholic Church issued the Index Liborum Prohibitorium in 1559, a list of books banned for their ideologically dangerous content. Under the guardianship of the Sacred Inquisition, thousands of books were banned and burned and their authors were tried for heresy and often burned themselves (Polastron 2007).

The index of prohibited books begun in 1559 was issued 20 times throughout the following centuries until it was finally suppressed in 1966 (ibid). Additional laws designed to protect society from inappropriate or dangerous books included a decree from the Catholic Church in 1542 that allowed no book to be printed or sold without its permission. Not to be outdone, Charles IX of France decreed in 1563 that no book could be printed without the special permission of the king (Baez 2008). As other rulers throughout Europe followed suit, issuing their own publication laws, all types of scientific and artistic expression were brought under the control of the government, which could effectively censor any materials it deemed dangerous or threatening to the morals of society.

Loosening the Bonds: The Age of Enlightenment

The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in Europe, commonly known as the Age of Enlightenment, brought about a loosening in the laws that governed censorship as the rights, liberties, and dignities of the individual were brought into focus and freedom of expression became the hallmark of the period. Publication laws that had been decreed in the previous centuries began to be attacked and removed, with Sweden being the first country to officially abolish censorship in 1766. The first amendment to the United States Constitution, ratified in 1790, guaranteed freedom of speech and the press to its citizens as two of humanity's most precious rights (Garry 1993).

But while censorship lost ground during the revolutions of the eighteenth century, the legal framework to limit free expression was still incorporated into most governments in the form of acts to protect national security as well as laws against libel. The parameters of these laws were often quite loose and, in the United States especially, courts were often left to determine the principles of and limits to free expression.

Publicly Led Censorship

Although the first wave of state-sponsored censorship had largely ended in Europe by the nineteenth century and was never firmly established in the United States at all, public concern for morality and safeguards against offensive literature did not cease. Censorship took a new form in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in the banning of “inappropriate” books by public librarians, teachers, and other citizen action groups in order to supposedly protect the innocence of children.

Mark Twain’s famous novel has been controversial nearly since its first publication, and many public libraries initially banned it for its “ course language” and slang vernacular

While libraries and schools were public institutions that were subject to the freedoms protected by the First Amendment of the Constitution, they were also still responsible to the public and its wishes for “appropriate literature.” Many books were banned from U.S. public libraries in the nineteenth century and well into the twentieth century, with Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn surprisingly being one of the books banned for “questionable content” in 1885 (Garry 1993). Even as recently as 1984, that novel was still under some scrutiny regarding its appropriateness for young readers.

While banning books from public schools and libraries is a less destructive form of censorship that became common practice in the United States and other Western European nations after the Enlightenment period, it is certainly not the only form of censorship that has targeted library holdings. Censorship has also occurred in the burning and destruction of libraries themselves throughout the centuries, with notable examples including the complete destruction of the University of Oxford library in 1683 under direct order of the king of England and the wholesale destruction of Albanian-language collections in Kosovo libraries from 1990 to 1999 (Polastron 2007). Burning of libraries was also common practice in both the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany, where some of the longest-lasting and most extensive censorship programs occurred during the twentieth century.

Totalitarian Censorship: Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, and Apartheid South Africa

Slow to take up the ideals of the Enlightenment period that abolished censorship throughout much of Western Europe in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Russia has had a long history of strict censorship. Save one brief period of tolerance and intellectual freedom from 1855 to 1865 under the reign of Alexander II, Russians have known true freedom of expression only since the last decade of the twentieth century (Knuth 2003).

From 1917 to the end of the 1980s, Russia and the other socialist republics included within the Soviet Union were governed under a strict rule of censorship enforced by a central censorship office, commonly known as Glavlit (ibid). The goal of this office was to purge the society of all ideas and expressions that could be regarded as destructive to the new communist order and to prevent political dissidence by shutting down hostile newspapers and publications. This harsh system of censorship spread quickly throughout the block of Eastern European nations, and by the time of the Stalin regime in the 1920s, the import of any foreign publication was completely cut off while all interior publications were regulated under the strict control of the government.

Under the Nazi regime of 1933 to 1945, Germany also experienced a period of strict censorship where all media, public events, and even private communication were censored by the government, primarily by Joseph Goebbels, the Minister of Propaganda (Knuth 2003). Presiding over a massive burning of over 20,000 offensive books in 1933, Goebbels enthusiastically declared, “From these ashes will rise the phoenix of the new spirit” (ibid).

Prior to the beginning of World War II, tens of thousands of books written by Jewish authors, communists, or any other author unsympathetic to the Nazi regime were thrown into the flames as a means of destroying critical viewpoints. As World War II commenced and the German stronghold spread throughout the European continent, censorship was also implemented in the occupied nations. All national newspapers, radios, and publishers were taken over or shut down completely upon the Nazis' arrival, and listening to foreign radio or disseminating illegal newspapers could be punishable by death. Despite the strict censorship, however, the illegal press continued to flourish in many occupied nations, making a firm stand against the brainwashing and cultural oblivion that Nazi censorship desired.

Censorship was also a key weapon used by the Apartheid regime of South Africa, which governed the nation from 1950 to 1994 (Coetzee 1996). Fueled by a policy of extreme racism, Apartheid leaders strictly censored any materials supporting the African National Congress (ANC), an anti-Apartheid liberation movement. The censorship affected all aspects of society, culture, and education, with censored items ranging from newspapers and pamphlets to T-shirts, buttons, and lighters that supported the ANC. Violators of the censorship policies were often tortured and even executed, but the ANC struggled relentlessly against Apartheid censorship until the end of the Apartheid regime in 1994 (ibid).

Modern-Day Censorship

Modern-day censorship in Iran has arroused a number of protests and public demonstrations, with many protestors overtly expressing displeasure with government policies through dress and graffiti

While freedom of expression in the twenty-first century may seem limitless, especially with the seemingly boundless ability to disseminate information provided by the Internet, censorship still occurs in one form or another throughout every country in the world. In Iran, the Supreme National Security Council has explicitly banned discussion in the media of any topics that might allow citizens to discover failures and abuses of the government (Baez 2008). Religious censorship also occurs in a type of modern-day Iranian Inquisition that results in assault and vandalism against journalists and news organizations perceived as critical of Islam. Attacks against journalists also continue to occur in many other countries throughout the world, and nearly half of the world’s population still lacks an independent press.

In China, internet users continue to experience official censorship of what they can do and see while on the Internet. Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, Chinese officials have sought to deny access to websites and information they deemed inappropriate or harmful to their constituents. Many leading search engines are forced to censor available information according to official regulations, and Google has threatened to remove its Chinese-language search engine (Google.cn) due to such censorship requirements. Social media sites are also restricted, with discussion or forum features for “inappropriate” topics often blocked (BBC News 2010). Despite international criticism of China’s internet policies, the worldwide web in China remains something less than the unlimited access to information it is elsewhere.

Even in the more liberal nations of the Western world, censorship continues to occur in the form of censored movies, video games, television, and literature. While the battle against censorship has certainly come a long way, freedom of expression will likely always be held in a delicate balance with the desires of some to determine and regulate public morality.

-- Posted March 20, 2010

References

Baez, Fernando. 2008. A Universal History of the Destruction of Books. New York, NY: Atlas & Co.

BBC News. 2010. “Timeline: China and Net Censorship.” Accessed March 18, 2010.

Coetzee, J. M. 1996. Giving Offense: Essays on Censorship. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Garry, Patrick M. 1993. An American Paradox: Censorship in a Nation of Free Speech. Westport, CT: Praeger.

Heins, Marjorie. 2001. Not in Front of the Children: Indecency, Censorship, and the Innocence of Youth. New York, NY: Hill and Wang.

Knuth, Rebecca. 2003. Libricide: The Regime-Sponsored Destruction of Books and Libraries in the Twentieth Century. Westport, CT: Praeger.