Censors, Seditionists, and Smut Peddlers:
William H. Hays

by Sacha A. Howells

As a Midwestern Republican politico, Will Hays had little to do with either the art or industry of making movies. But as studio heads prepared to fight off the twin dogs of religious activism and congressional legislation, both calling for motion pictures to operate within the limits of "decency," Hays was a perfect choice. As head of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors Association, he was supposed to keep the censors at bay without getting in the way of the ultimate cinematic art: profit. But with the help of a Catholic priest, a religious magazine publisher, and an able hatchetman, Hays' restrictive Production Code shackled Hollywood's directors, writers, and actors, deciding the language, look, and meaning of American films until its repeal in 1966.

Mr. Hays Goes to Hollywood
In the 1920s, Hollywood's movie studios were emerging as major forces of cultural and economic influence. But while profits dictated titillating films heavy on sex and violence, a vocal minority of religious activists and conservative politicians called for federal censorship -- or boycotts. A rash of scandals rocked Hollywood, bringing the outrage to a boil. Silent superstar Fatty Arbuckle's 1921 trial for rape and murder splashed across the tabloids, and director William Desmond Taylor's 1922 murder turned up affairs that wrecked careers. Arbuckle was acquitted and Taylor's murder never solved, but Hollywood had taken a beating.

Although the studios feared picketing and federal legislation, they recognized that their raciest fare was also their most profitable. To tread the narrow line between boycott and censorship, they needed a front man, a self-imposed moral arbiter who would allow the movie studios to keep up business as usual while calming the politicians and the preachers. The movie company presidents turned to Will Hays, former chairman of the Republican National Committee, an elder of the Presbyterian Church, and Postmaster General under Warren G. Harding.

In 1922, the presidents of the movie companies formed the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors Association, with Hays at its head. Throughout the '20s, Hays performed admirably. Shortly after the formation of the MPPDA, he helped fight off a Massachusetts censorship law, and the Hays Office list of "Don'ts and Be Carefuls" was all but ignored. Faced with a 1929 Senate bill to put the film industry under Federal Trade Commission control, Hays had to act. Strictly enforced regulations were the answer, and when Hays read a restriction code authored by a priest and a powerful Catholic publisher, he adopted it as his own. The studio presidents adopted the Motion Picture Production Code, known as the "Hays Code," in 1930.

The Hays Code
The Code itself was a condescending, paternalistic document. Because motion pictures were popular with "the cultivated and the rude, the mature and the immature, the self-respecting and the criminal," they had to be controlled more strictly than other forms of expression. "The latitude given to film material cannot, in consequence, be as wide as the latitude given to book material." The Code claimed that motion pictures had "larger moral responsibilities" because "[s]mall communities, remote from sophistication and from the hardening process which often takes place in the ethical and moral standards of larger cities, are easily and readily reached by any sort of film."

All of this was justification for the industry's willing surrender of its First Amendment freedoms. Once the Code had established that the rules were there to protect the masses and the rubes, it proceeded to outline a list of prohibited material. Among the Code's prescriptions were bans on the subjects of "sex perversion" (homosexuality), miscegenation, and venereal disease. Obscenity -- "even when likely to be understood only by part of the audience" -- was forbidden, along with profanity, nudity, "dances which emphasize indecent movements," and explicit violence.

Religion was the Code's sacred cow, with ministers of any faith barred from being comedic or villainous characters. Sex was to be completely avoided. The sanctity of marriage was to be upheld, adultery "must not be explicitly treated, or justified, or presented attractively," and "passion should be so treated that these scenes do not stimulate the lower and baser element."

Even those unsavory elements of society that were permitted, like murder, suicide, and kidnapping, had to be condemned. Murder could never go unpunished, suicide could never be justified, and a kidnapped child always had to be returned unharmed by the final reel. More than just covering up the naughty bits, the Hays Code dictated what films would be made and how they would be written.

Still, it wasn't until 1934 that the Hays Office got its teeth. Catholic leaders formed the "Legion of Decency," enlisting followers to sign a pledge promising to boycott films that offended "decency and Christian morality." Facing massive boycotts and revenue loss, Hays turned the Studio Relations Office into the Production Code Administration and appointed the outspoken Joseph Breen its head. Backed by the studio heads, Hays ordered that all treatments, scripts and final cuts be cleared by Breen; without a Production Code Seal of approval, no picture would be carried by the major theater chains. Under Hays' new enforcer, American cinema was primed for the butcher block.

Slashing the Silver Screen
For 30 years, every studio film was screened by the Production Code Administration. PCA cuts primarily consisted of an obsessive litany of half-glimpsed breasts, along with a laundry list of proscribed "dirty" words. The Hays Office excised lines like "I don't want anyone sticking to my tail," "Nuts to you," and "Park your south end," and issued prim directives like "It might be good to eliminate the line 'ball bearings.' " District attorneys, clergymen and politicians were not to be ridiculed, and women's undergarments, even hanging on a clothesline, were verboten.

The Code was not absolute; movie producers could plead their case to Breen or an Association board, and some cuts were overturned. For instance, the Hays Office could handle the lust and violence of Gone With the Wind -- as long as it was toned down -- but not the d-word in that final scene. Breen's suggestion? That Rhett Butler's climactic line be changed to "Frankly my dear, I don't care." Fortunately, the line was saved.

Besides petty quibbles about breast coverage and bad language, however, the Hays Office often crossed the line into meddling with a picture's plot. In A Farewell to Arms, Breen insisted that the two leads not be permitted to carry on their illicit affair. In The Bride of Frankenstein, the Hays Office dictated that "All material which suggests that [the monster] desires a sexual companion is objectionable. We suggest that you substitute the word 'companion.' " In W.C. Fields' Never Give a Sucker an Even Break, the Hays Office objected to "innumerable jocular references to drinking and liquor" and 60 scenes set in cocktail lounges, "all of which will have to be deleted" -- even though Prohibition had been repealed seven years earlier.

Rhett without his damn, poor Frankenstein stuck with a "companion," and W.C. Fields on the wagon … the Hays Office's Hollywood was an awfully dull place.

Old Codes Don't Die, They Just Fade Away
In 1945 Will Hays resigned, bowing out of the fight just in time. In the early '50s, the Production Code faced battles on multiple fronts. For the first time since 1934, Association theaters booked a film without the Production Code Seal: Vittorio De Sica's The Bicycle Thief. Despite the film's international acclaim and artistic merit, Breen peevishly insisted on cutting two inoffensive scenes. De Sica refused and the theaters played his picture anyway; the unedited film went on to win the Oscar for Best Foreign Film.

In 1954, the Code was amended to allow alcohol, miscegenation, and even some profanity, the PCA's hard-nosed Joe Breen resigned, and the Code was dealt a symbolic blow with the death of Will Hays himself. Although the Hays Code lingered on, its teeth were all but rotten. Even the staunchly conservative Legion of Decency reformed as the kinder, gentler National Catholic Office for Motion Pictures, advocating a ratings system rather than outright censorship. The Code was abolished in 1966, and eventually replaced with the ratings system we have today.

"The Lieberman Code"?
Will Hays' role was never to become a censor supreme; rather, he was hired by the movie companies themselves in order to fight off public disapproval without hurting profits. But pressure from a vocal minority turned his officers into moral watchdogs for three decades. Forty-five years later, a familiar cultural scapegoat has resurfaced. In his 1996 presidential campaign, Bob Dole railed against "mindless violence and loveless sex" in American movies. He lost, of course, but in the 2000 elections both Democrats and Republicans took up the cause, ordering federal investigations into the movie studios' ratings systems and marketing practices. William Bennett's "Appeal to Hollywood," signed by politicians from both parties, called for self-imposed industry censorship, and conservative author Jude Wanniski is suggesting a new church-powered Legion of Decency.

From our 21st-century vantage point the Hays Code seems quaint, a bit of a joke, but we may not be so comfortably removed from censorship. If the film industry once again decides to regulate itself rather than face public outcry and Congressional legislation, the First Amendment won't help us any. Somebody else better tell Frankenstein he may lose his bride. I don't have the heart.