Father Morton A. Hill, S.J. (1917-1985) was a leader of the campaign against pornography in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. He was one of the founders of

Morality in Media The National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE), previously known as Morality in Media and Operation Yorkville, is an American conservative anti-pornography organization. The group has also campaigned against sex trafficking, same-sex marria ...

, which was created in 1962 to fight pornography. President

Lyndon B. Johnson Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), also known as LBJ, was the 36th president of the United States, serving from 1963 to 1969. He became president after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, under whom he had served a ...

appointed him to the

President's Commission on Obscenity and Pornography In 1969, the United States Supreme Court ruled in '' Stanley v. Georgia'' that people could view whatever they wished in the privacy of their own homes. In response, the United States Congress funded the President's Commission on Obscenity and Porno ...

. Believing that the Commission was stacked with supporters of loosening laws on pornography, Hill and another clergyman on the Commission, Dr. Winfrey C. Link, issued the Hill-Link Minority Report rebutting the conclusions of the majority report, which held that pornography should be decriminalized as there were no links between it and criminal behavior. Issued in 1970, the majority report was rejected by both President

Richard Nixon Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 until Resignation of Richard Nixon, his resignation in 1974. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican ...

and the

United States Congress The United States Congress is the legislature, legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is a Bicameralism, bicameral legislature, including a Lower house, lower body, the United States House of Representatives, ...

. The Hill-Link Report, which recommended maintaining anti-obscenity statutes, was read into the record of both the

United States Senate The United States Senate is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the upper house, with the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives being the lower house. Together, the Senate and ...

and the

United States House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the lower house, with the U.S. Senate being the upper house. Together, the House and Senate have the authority under Artic ...

. It was cited by the

Burger Court The Burger Court was the period in the history of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1969 to 1986, when Warren E. Burger served as Chief Justice of the United States. Burger succeeded Earl Warren as Chief Justice after Warren's retiremen ...

in its 1973 obscenity decisions, including Miller v. California. According to the Morality in Media site, Hill was influential in the

Reagan Administration Ronald Reagan's tenure as the 40th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 1981, and ended on January 20, 1989. Reagan, a Republican from California, took office following his landslide victory over ...

's efforts against pornography. In March 1983, he headed a coalition of groups spearheading the

anti-pornography movement Reasons for opposition to pornography include Religious views on pornography, religious objections, Morality, moral values, Feminist views of pornography, feminist concerns, as well as Effects of pornography, harmful effects, such as pornography ...

that met with President Reagan at the White House. Hill and his allies recommended that the President appoint an anti-pornography czar to coordinate the federal government's efforts to crack down on porn. The Morality in Media site states, "As a result of this meeting, a White House Working Group on Pornography was formed in June of 1983, and in December, President Reagan addressed the nation's U.S. Attorneys and called for tighter enforcement of the laws

References in popular culture

Father Hill debated novelist

Gore Vidal Eugene Luther Gore Vidal ( ; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his acerbic epigrammatic wit. His novels and essays interrogated the Social norm, social and sexual ...

on the '' David Susskind Show'' on March 17, 1968, in a program called "Read Any Dirty Books Lately?" The previous year, Vidal had published a #1 best-selling novel, '' Myra Breckenridge'', which many considered pornographic. In the sequel to the book, ''

Myron Myron of Eleutherae (480–440 BC) (; , ''Myrōn'' ) was an Athenian sculptor from the mid-5th century BC. Alongside three other Greek sculptors, Polykleitos Pheidias, and Praxiteles, Myron is considered as one of the most important sculptors ...

'', Vidal used Father Hill's name as a euphemism for a "dirty word" in order to conform to the U.S. Supreme Court's Miller v. California decision that enshrined "community standards" as the legal test for pornography.

Sources

*Obscenity.crimes.org
"FR. MORTON A. HILL, S.J.: Defender of the Public Decencies"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hill, Morton A 1917 births 1985 deaths 20th-century American Jesuits Anti-pornography activists