Frauds Exposed

The New York Society for the Suppression of Vice sounds like the satirical invention of a modern wag, but it was a very real organization dedicated to policing public morality in the late 19th century. Its founder, Anthony Comstock, was notorious as a crusader for "decency" and a strident advocate of censorship-so strident, in fact, that George Bernard Shaw coined the term "comstockery" to refer to his zeal for the cause. (Shaw was one of Comstock's victims; so were Theodore Dreiser and D.H. Lawrence.)

Here, in this rare 1880 work, hard to find today in an elegant edition, Comstock obsessively details the results of his work as a special agent in the New York post office, which granted him the power to inspect the mail, determine what was "obscene," and harass the senders with the full power of the law behind him.

A relic of American Victorian-era prudery, this makes for wickedly amusing reading today.

American author ANTHONY COMSTOCK (1844-1915) also wrote Gambling Outrages (1887) and Morals Versus Art (1888).