Daniel Lord

As the popularity of motion pictures surged, controversy over the content of the films became increasingly common, with many Americans objecting that the film industry was promoting and spreading immorality. By the mid-1920’s over two dozen states had passed censorship laws, regulating what could and could not been shown in movies. Faced with the prospect of having to make or edit their movies to comply with the many (often inconsistent) laws, and with more such laws on the horizon, industry leaders saw that the need for some universally accepted standards. In 1927 the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America adopted a list of “do’s and don’ts,” but recognized the need for a more formal set of standards.

Daniel Lord, a Catholic priest living in St. Louis, was an influential writer who had served as a technical consultant for several motion pictures. Lord was particularly concerned about the potential corrupting influence of immorality in motion pictures on children. “Silent smut had been bad,” he wrote. “Vocal smut cried to the censors for vengeance.”

So, in 1929 Lord, with the help of a colleague, undertook creating a Code of Standards for the film industry. He presented the Code to Hollywood studio heads in early 1930, and they agreed to adopt and abide by it. Thus was born the Motion Picture Production Code (often called the Hays Code, after Will Hays, then president of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America).

The Code began by identifying three guiding principles:

- No picture shall be produced that will lower the moral standards of those who see it. Hence the sympathy of the audience should never be thrown to the side of crime, wrongdoing, evil or sin.

- Correct standards of life, subject only to the requirements of drama and entertainment, shall be presented.

- Law, natural or human, shall not be ridiculed, nor shall sympathy be created for its violation.

Next it elaborated on those principles and gave examples of their application. For example, crimes “shall never be presented in such a way as to throw sympathy with the crime as against law and justice or to inspire others with a desire for imitation.” With regard to sex, “The sanctity of the institution of marriage and the home shall be upheld. Pictures shall not infer that low forms of sex relationship are the accepted or common thing.” Depictions of “sexual perversion” and sexual relations between white and black persons were specifically prohibited. The Code also prohibited the use in films of obscenity, profanity, and sexually suggestive dancing, and provided that “no film or episode may throw ridicule on any religious faith.” The Code required that “the treatment of bedrooms must be governed by good taste and delicacy,” that any use of the flag must be “consistently respectful,” and that “the history, institutions, prominent people and citizenry of other nations shall be represented fairly.”

For thirty years the movie industry largely complied with the Code. But by the 1950’s producers and writing began pushing the limits of it, particularly after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that movies were entitled to the protection of the 1st Amendment. By the late 1960’s the Code was being routinely ignored or violated and in 1968 it was replaced by the film rating system, which is still in use today.

Daniel Aloysius Lord, creator of the 1930 Motion Picture Production Code, died at age 66 on January 15, 1955.