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The debate about censorship takes place on various levels. Internet kids curse against governments who try to restrict access to Internet sites. Radical feminists want to ban every form of pornography as they believe it degrades and dehumanizes women. Liberals on the other hand call for the abolition of censorship because it violates the human right of freedom of speech and expression. Newspaper journalists and editors fear retaliation through defamation trials and by the almighty proprietors of the media organizations they are working for if they do not report along the mainstream.

In this essay I will examine all these facets of the censorship debate. I will start with a history of censorship in Australia. Exemplary and due to restriction of space, I will focus merely on book censorship. Then will follow a discussion of two current issues in the debate: First, the argument surrounding the Australian government’s attempt to restrict access to pornographic content in the internet by legislation. Second, the issue of pornography, censorship and freedom of speech. This will take place on a more general level and less related to current Australian problems.

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The right of freedom of speech is not codified in the Australian Constitution. However, it has been recognized by the judiciary through several rulings of the High Court, especially in recent time. ¹ Since the time of European Settlement, print publications have been subject to censorship through customs and defamation laws. This chapter will give a brief overview of the changes and processes in the Australian censorship legislation.

Newspapers were among the first publications to be censored by the government. In the early years of settlement, the administration tried to ban everything that could insult the mother country England, the Queen and everything else that would in their perception disturb the social order or that was labeled ’obscene’, ’indecent’, or ’immoral’. The first Australian news-

paper to be censored was the 6DWLULVW DQG 6SRUWLQJ &KURQLFOH. In 1843, its publishers were charged with printing

’a supposed dialogue between a number of lewd women, of a most obscene and disgusting description. The offence was charged to be to the high displeasure of Almighty God; to the scandal and reproach of the Christian religion; in contempt of our Lady the Queen and her laws; and to the great offence of all

¹ J. Schultz: 5HYLYLQJWKHIRXUWKHVWDWHGHPRFUDF\DFFRXQWDELOLW\DQGWKHPHGLD, Melbourne: University of Cambridge Press, 1998, p. 79.

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Civil Governments; to the evil and pernicious example of all others; and against the peace of our said

Lady the Queen, her crown and dignity.’

(6\GQH\0RUQLQJ+HUDOG, 19 April 1843) 2

In 1875, Victorian magistrates were entitled to issue search warrants for police to seize obscene publications. In addition, they could order the destruction of such material. ³ Books were also frequently censored. While mostly imported, the responsible control body was the Customs Department. Its officers would seize books that they found objectionable and the importer would be charged before a jury that ruled on the publication’s confiscation due to indecency.

After federation, this practice was institutionalized in the Federal Customs Act of 1901. Some of the more controversial cases of censorship concerned books of non-English origin. ⁴ This was due to a general suspicion in Australian society towards cultures other than the English. Gott and Linden note that this suspicion prevailed until the 1960s. ⁵ After two years of rather arbitrary censorship, and widespread criticism from the press and the publishing industry, the customs department adopted a more liberal policy and withdrew almost completely from cen-soring books for a period of nearly thirty years. Coleman, explaining this policy, states that ’...in England during most of that period there were no police prosecutions of serious novelists.’ ⁶ A change in the Customs Department’s censorship policy occurred with the beginning of the economic crisis 1929. In a climate of increased uncertainty and fear of depression a need to protect the values and the lifestyle of Australian society from everything that might challenge

or question them emerged. The ban of James Joyce’s 8O\VVHV in 1929 is seen as the starting point of this period of more rigid censorship. ⁷ Again, in response to that, public disagreement and criticism aroused, which forced the Customs Department to revise its approach to censorship once more. As early as in 1933 the Department had established the Book Censorship Advisory Council, a board that was created to give expert advice to the Minister, if he sought it, and in 1937 it was finally replaced by the Literature Censorship Board. The establishment of this body formalized the censoring process, however it still had only advisory status and the Minister of Customs was not obliged to seek this advice. Nevertheless, during this third

² Cited in: R. Gott and R. Linden: &XWLWRXWFHQVRUVKLSLQ$XVWUDOLD, Carlton (Vic.): CIS, 1994, p. 4.

³ Ibid., p. 4.

⁴ See P. Coleman: Obscenity, blasphemy & sedition: 100 years of Australian censorship, Sydney: Angus and

Robertson, 1974, pp. 6-7 for the exemplary ’Balzac’ and ’de Kock’ cases.

⁵ Op. cit., pp. 2-3.

⁶ Coleman, op. cit., p. 9.

⁷ Ibid., p. 13.

5 period of censorship a number of formerly banned books, including 8O\VVHV ⁸ , were released. The system prevailed until after the Second World War.

In 1957 the then Minister for Customs, Senator Denham Hently, ordered that in the future, all

books under consideration of a ban PXVW be submitted to the Censorship Board. The Board was extended to four members, one a woman, and in 1960 an Appeal Board, consisting of three members, one of which was also a woman, was established. Furthermore, the Censorship Board was ordered to regularly review the list of banned books that led to the release of all 178 publications on that list. Last, all university libraries were allowed to import any books they wished, provided the restriction of censored issues. ⁹ This formalization was upheld during the 1960s.

Another major leap towards a further liberation was taken in 1971 by Don Chipp, then Minister for Customs. He brought forward a whole new approach towards the issue of censorship. In calling it ’evil’ and stating that ’[it] is to be condemned’, he called for a reduction in government action and called upon the people to take censorship in their own hands:

’People should censor more and more. The individual, the bookseller, should have a responsibility, the television station, the radio station, the parent, the individual; Governments should censor less and less, move more and more out of the field and leave it to individual choice. I would have thought that is liberalism.’ 10

Chipp was convinced that one man/women, respectively one minister, could not decide what his/her fellow citizens should be allowed to read. This new way of thinking reflected in a sense the beginning transition in Australian politics away from the conservative ’White-Australia-policy’ towards a concept of a multicultural and more liberal society. Another step in that direction was made when the Labor Party under Prime Minister Gough Whitlam came to power in 1972. The responsibility for customs censorship shifted to the At-torney General and the party policy read:

’...adults [should] be entitled to read, hear or view what they wish in private and public and (...) persons (and those in their care) [should] not [be] exposed to unsolicited material offensive to them.’ 11

However, the development of censorship laws and the censoring practice in Australia should not be understood as a continuing process towards liberalization. On the contrary, it must be ⁸ The book was banned again in 1941, an event that showed the limitations of the Board (ibid, p. 18-20).

⁹ For the whole paragraph, see ibid., p. 21.

¹⁰ Cited in: ibid., p. 24.