The Truth About the Comstock Act

The anti-obscenity law is unenforceable and probably unconstitutional. Conservatives still want to use it to ban medication abortions.

BY HASSAN ALI KANU APRIL 9, 2024


Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito apparently took a cue from extremist anti-abortion activists last month when he asked during oral arguments on the legal availability of abortion medication called mifepristone why the Food and Drug Administration hadn’t “at least considered the application of 18 U.S.C. 1461” when the agency approved it for public use.

Alito was stealthily referring to the Comstock Act, a 150-year-old zombie statute that’s also referenced by code name only in Project 2025, the Republican Party’s platform for a potential second Trump presidency.

The 1873 statute made it a federal crime to mail anything “obscene, lewd, lascivious, indecent, filthy or vile,” anything designed for “immoral use,” and specifically in one section, any items “adapted or intended for producing abortion.” It’s worth bearing in mind that the general anti-vice provision, not the anti-abortion one, comes first in the statute.

https://prospect.org/justice/2024-04-09-truth-comstock-act-mifepristone-abortion/