Anthony Comstock was one of the most prominent reformers in the Victorian era of the later nineteenth century. Other biographies included in this encyclopedia look at the leading gamblers, certainly rogues of the time, but some attention should be given to one who might be truly considered the greatest rogue of all. Comstock did not cheat the innocent, naive, and greedy out of their money. Rather, he purposely cheated society out of personal freedoms, and his vehicle for doing so was government policy and police enforcement powers. His target was sin—all types of sin, especially those of a sexual nature, but also the sins of drinking alcohol and gambling. The impact of the laws he pushed toward passage is still felt today.
On 7 March 1844, Anthony Comstock was born in the small town of New Canaan, Connecticut. He was raised in a very religious family, and he had a disciplined childhood shielded from sinful activities. He came out of this cocoon in 1863, when he joined the 17th Connecticut Company for service in the Civil War. He felt an obligation to serve in place of his brother, who had fallen in battle. The 17th Company saw firefights in South Carolina before it withdrew for passive duty in St. Augustine, Florida. Comstock’s real battles began there. He confronted the foul language and base habits of his fellow soldiers, and he resolved that he would have to change their behaviors. He found the means to change other people in the Army’s Christian Commission and the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA). After the war, he moved to New York City and found that once again he was surrounded by sins of all kinds. He actively involved his YMCA comrades in harassing the sinners at every opportunity. He pressured police forces to enforce laws against prostitution and wide-open drinking and gambling.
His politics of enforcement put him in direct opposition to feminist groups. He gained considerable attention in seeking to win a prosecution against Victoria Claffin Woodhall, a free-love advocate who ran for president in 1872. As the result of the following he gained in the battle, he went to Washington, D.C., and secured passage of what became known as the Comstock Obscenity Law. The law prohibited the mailing of any materials with a sexual message of any type. In 1873, he secured a position as the chief inspector of the Postal Service, so the enforcement of the law was in his hands. He went after the job with vigor.
Soon afterwards, he persuaded the New York legislature to charter the New York Society to Suppress Vice. The charter act gave officials of the society “arrest” powers as if they were police officers. Comstock won support from several leading entrepreneurs who wanted to root out the influence of sin over their workforce. Among his supporters was J. P. Morgan. Comstock pushed the New York legislature to act as well. In 1882, state laws were recodified, and all gambling except for horse racing was made illegal. Anthony Comstock went to work against gambling. He harassed the police into some prosecutions against casinos that operated openly in New York City. In this fight he was not successful until 1900 and 1901, when he forced Richard Canfield to close down his city casino, the most glamorous in the country at the time. Comstock was less successful in closing down the Canfield casino in Saratoga.
During Comstock’s later career, he did not emphasize his disdain for gambling, but he pushed where he could. He rivaled, but also allied, Rev. Charles Parkhurst and the Society for the Prevention of Crime in his fights. He was with Parkhurst in 1890 as the reformers persuaded Congress to pass the law banning the use of the U.S. mails by lotteries and other gambling interests. Comstock’s activities were also blended into those of the Progressive movement, and he was aboard the ride that found all gambling, except racing, banned everywhere. Soon after his death, all alcoholic beverages were banned throughout the United States as well.
|
|