Established in 443 BC, the office of censor in ancient Rome evolved into one of the most powerful and influential offices in that empire. Our practice of a census comes from this office, as that was one of the duties of those who held that position. Other duties would eventually include regulating moral conduct and making sure only qualified people were allowed into the Roman Senate.
Censors were elected every four or five years, for a term of 18 months. During its 400 plus years, censor’s powers expanded, and the holders of that office were highly regarded in Roman society. When the Empire superseded the Republic, the office was no longer a part of the political scene; this ended after the last censor election in 22BC.
Since that time, the word has become less honored and censorship is looked at as undesirable. Censorship is now defined as “The suppression or prohibition of any parts of books, films, news, etc. that are considered obscene, politically unacceptable, or a threat to security.”
Now, especially in the United States, we cherish the right of free expression and freedom of speech and generally do not censor opposing viewpoints. We think of the Nazi book-burning of the 1930s as a radical form of censorship, and even today there are nations which will strictly enforce speech codes. Examples abound in nations controlled by Communists or dictators; in certain countries Christianity is curtailed, and in many Islamic societies one cannot freely speak of religion or politics without incurring the wrath of the authorities.
A form of censorship is called “prior restraint”, where speakers or articles or books are refused public expression before a speech or publication of an article or book. Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri had his book deal with a major publisher canceled because the content did not meet their political standards. This kind of censorship should be troubling to any American; freedom of speech, the press, the freedom to express divergent ideas is one of the basic tenets of our civic ‘religion’.
We live in a sparsely populed county of southeastern Illinois. Our 2020 census will not reach 20,000, making Edgar County one of the least populous of Illinois’ 102 counties. The largest town (city?) is Paris, the county seat. It also has the most widely read newspaper, The Prairie Press, which is published once a week, on Saturday. One of the features of this rag is the Letters to the Editor.
Over the past few years, about five people, on a regular basis, have their letters published in the paper. Two of these, my wife Jane and I, write from the conservative perspective, and three write from the liberal standpoint. Sometimes this has taken the form of answering the other side. We have had many readers express their approval of our efforts to keep the public informed of certain issues. The other side, I am sure, has their cheerleaders, too.
Imagine my surprise when, in the issue of The Prairie Press of January 9, the co-owners of the paper proclaimed that no letter from either side would be published for the next 90 days as a means of lowering the heated rhetoric in the nation over politics and political issues. A first step toward censorship was when the editor, a couple of years ago, limited any one writer to one letter per month.
This amounts to “prior restraint” as neither side is allowed expression even though the actual content of our letters cannot be known until they are written. We feel this is a direct censorship of our right to free speech, expression and use of the press Neither of the co-owners (one of whom is a neighbor in our subdivision) has reached out to us to explain the exact nature of what we write that is so abhorrent that it cannot be given space in the paper.
Those who wrote the First Amendment that we have the freedom of the press in our nation did not intend for ideas to be buried under the bias of those who published. What people like Thomas Jefferson believed was that the marketplace of ideas was enhanced when free citizens were able to write, speak, argue and debate in the public arena so that the best ideas were able to be refined into good public policies.
I am sure that those on the opposite side feel as frustrated as we are, and feel that we all are being targeted for this unhealthy prior restraint.
Since the paper is privately owned, the co-owners have the legal right to deny publication of material with which they disagree. But there is a moral obligation to serve all of the readers in this county no matter their personal political viewpoints.
Censorship, in the modern sense, is repugnant in the modern world. And it is so much more so in a small town with a captive readership. The argument used to do so is disingenuous at best, and does not address how limiting letters in this small-town paper will dampen down the heat in the national dialogue.
We would welcome your comments, even if you disagree with our
premise. But in all my fifty plus years of studying, reading and teaching history and civics in Edgar County, I never thought I would see the ugly specter of censorship arise here.