BOOKSELLERS FINED.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 805, 29 January 1910, Page 4

BOOKSELLERS FINED.

SALK OF ALLEGED OBSCENE MATTER.

Dr. A. M’Arthur, S.M., at Wellington this week gave judgment in the cases against two booksellers charged with selling printed matter of an obscene nature. In the case affecting Kenneth Aitken, the Magistrate retuaiked : “This is an information laid by the Chief Detective of Wellington against the defendant for selling to one Alex. Bailey certain printed matter, to wit, a copy of a newspaper known as New Zealand Truth, of the 13th November, 1909, which as to parts thereof, is of an obscene nature. . . In my opinion, the articles, both in its heading and in its three columns of matter, is ot an obscene nature. There is nothing in the article itself to justify its having been written. After referring to some of the headings to the article, the Magistrate continued : “According to the standard dictionary, an obscene publication is an indecent publication which, whether true or false, tends to deprave and corrupt. An obscene paper is one which contains immodest and indecent matter, the reading whereof would have a tendency to deprave and corrupt the minds ot those into whose hands the publication might fall, and whose minds are open to such immoral tendencies. The character of a publication is not to be determined by the motives of the author or sender in making or selling it.” The whole question was, said Dr. M’Arthur, well argued in the case of the Queen v. Hicklin, and the judgment in the case was decisive. Cockburn, C.J., said : “ I think the test of obscenity is this —whether the tendency ol the matter charged as obscenity is to deprave and corrupt those whose minds are open to such immoral influences, and into whose hands a publication of this sort may fall. Now, with regard to this work, it is quite certain that it would suggest to the minds of the young of either sex, or even to persons of more advanced years, thoughts of a most impure and libidinous character. ... I take it,

tberefore, that apart from the ulterior object which the publisher of this work had in view, the work itself is, in every sense of the term, an obscene publication.”

“ I think these remarks of the Chief Justice,” said Dr. M’Arthur, ‘‘are directly applicable to the case now before me. There is no necessity to particularise, as the whole long article is full of matter of an obscene nature. The defendant is convicted and will be fined ,£5.”

A similar fine was inflicted in the case against Herbert Mowtall.