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Indecency, obscenity, immorality, vice, depravity, corruption: the chilling effect of the Censorship of Publications Acts – Part 2 (censor and chill)

Eoin — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 13:21:21 +0000

The Censorship of Publications Board was established in 1929 (pursuant to section 3 of the Censorship of Publications Act, 1929). It has the power to prohibit the publication of indecency, obscenity, immorality, vice, depravity, and corruption (pursuant to section 2 of the 1929 Act, and section 1, section 7(a), and section 9(1)(a), of the Censorship of Publications Act, 1946). The question in this post is whether the operation of these vague standards unconstitutionally chills the exercise of free speech rights protected by the Constitution. Spoiler alert: the answer is yes.

In my previous post, I argued that, as a matter of Irish law, the Supreme Court should hold that, as a matter of principle, the legal uncertainty from the operation of vague terms, such as indecency, obscenity, immorality, vice, depravity, and corruption, has an obvious and unconstitutional chilling effect upon public discourse; that such uncertainty raises special Article 40.6.1(i) concerns because of its obvious chilling effect upon free speech; that such terms take within their sweep a great deal of protected speech and therefore have an unconstitutional chilling effect upon free speech protected by Article 40.6.1(i); and that the effect of such vague prohibitions is to deter not only the expression at which the prohibition was aimed, but also legitimate expression, so that creativity and the beneficial exchange of ideas will be unconstitutionally affected.…

Indecency, obscenity, immorality, vice, depravity, corruption: the chilling effect of the Censorship of Publications Acts – Part 1 (general principles)

Eoin — Fri, 22 May 2026 08:51:41 +0000

In my previous two posts (here and here), I considered whether the standards of indecency, obscenity, sexual immorality, unnatural vice, corruption, and depravity – in section 2 of the Censorship of Publications Act, 1929 and section 1, section 7(a), and section 9(1)(a), of the Censorship of Publications Act, 1946 – are so vague, unclear and ambiguous as to be unconstitutionally uncertain. When the principle of legal certainty applies, the unconstitutionality flows simply from the vagueness of the terms of the offence, and the analysis does not need to engage with additional constitutional rights. However, further constitutional difficulties can arise when the uncertainty in question also implicates additional constitutional rights (cp Bita v DPP [2020] IECA 69 (13 March 2020) [56] (Donnelly J)). Such cases concern “human activity which benefits from constitutional protection and is therefore safeguarded under the Constitution against arbitrary or disproportionate interference” (Tallon v DPP [2022] IEHC 322 (31 May 2022) (noted here, republished here) [116] (Phelan J); aff’d [2023] IECA 125 (25 May 2023) (noted here) (Donnelly J; Edwards and McCarthy JJ concurring)). In some of the cases, the infringement of such rights re-enforces the finding of vagueness; in others, it provides an alternative, independent, ground for the unconstitutionality of the offences.…

Indecency, obscenity, immorality, vice, depravity, corruption: unconstitutional uncertainty and the Censorship of Publications Acts – Part 2 (censoring under conditions of uncertainty)

Eoin — Tue, 19 May 2026 08:04:18 +0000

In my previous post, we saw that section 2 of the Censorship of Publications Act, 1929 and section 1, section 7(a), and section 9(1)(a), of the Censorship of Publications Act, 1946, are directed against indecency, obscenity, sexual immorality, unnatural vice, corruption, and depravity. These are capricious words and fickle concepts, and the question arises whether those standards have stable and certain constitutional cores, or whether they are so vague, unclear and ambiguous as to be unconstitutionally uncertain.

On this question, in my previous post, we saw that, on the one hand if a statutory provision is ambiguous, arbitrary, imprecise, indiscriminate, or obscure, if it is hopelessly and irremediably vague, if it lends itself to arbitrary and inconsistent application, or if it results in obscurity of application to fact or impossibility of interpretation so as to find a consistent solution, then it fails to satisfy the requirements of the principle of legal certainty, and is thus constitutionally impermissible. This is illustrated by King v Attorney General [1981] IR 233, striking down section 4 of the Vagrancy Act, 1824. On the other hand, generality is not uncertainty: a statutory provision can legitimately be expressed in general terms in order to maintain appropriate flexibility; and a potentially uncertain provision can be rendered certain by interpretation and precedent.…

Indecency, obscenity, immorality, vice, depravity, corruption: unconstitutional uncertainty and the Censorship of Publications Acts – Part 1 (general principles)

Eoin — Mon, 18 May 2026 08:04:52 +0000

Indecency, obscenity immorality, vice, depravity, corruption – it almost seems like a formula for a good party, or a line from Tom Lehrer‘s march for Smut. But, in fact, these six words are the foundations of the Censorship of Publications regime in Ireland, established pursuant to the Censorship of Publications Acts, 1929, 1946, and 1967. An elaborate – notorious, not to say shameful – edifice of censorship has been constructed upon them; and, in this post and forthcoming posts, I want to assess the constitutional strength of those foundations.

In Irish Family Planning Association v Ryan [1979] IR 295 (27 July 1978) (discussed in earlier posts here and here), the Censorship of Publications Board (Board) issued a prohibition order in respect of Family Planning – A Guide for Parents and Prospective Parents published by the Irish Family Planning Association (IFPA), on the grounds that the Guide was an “indecent or obscene” book pursuant to section 7(a) of the 1946 Act. In Melton Enterprises Ltd v Censorship of Publications Board [2003] 3 IR 623, [2004] 1 ILRM 260, [2003] IESC 55 (4 November 2003) (discussed in a previous post here), the Board was considering whether to issue a prohibition order in respect of The Weekly Sport, a tabloid newspaper published by Melton, on the grounds that the paper was an “indecent or obscene” periodical pursuant to section 9(1)(a) of the 1946 Act.…

Irish Family Planning Association v Ryan and the Censorship of Publications Acts – the judgments

Eoin — Wed, 13 May 2026 08:10:03 +0000

This is the fourth post in my ongoing (and expanding) series about the Censorship of Publications Acts, 1929, 1946, and 1967 (on which, see Brad Kent Censorship and the Irish Writer. Politics, Polemics, and the International Dialectic (University of Toronto Press, 2026) [hereafter: Kent]). In my previous post, I looked at some of the interesting background to Irish Family Planning Association v Ryan [1979] IR 295 (27 July 1978). In this one, I want to look at the judgments in the case itself. Section 6 of the 1946 Act concerns the examination of books by the Board; subsection (1) requires the Board to “examine every book duly referred to them”; subsection (2) provides for matters to which the Board shall have regard in that examination; and subsection (3) provides:

When examining a book under this section, the Censorship Board may communicate with the author, editor or publisher of the book and may take into account any representation made by him in relation thereto.

The Board had issued a prohibition order in respect of Family Planning – A Guide for Parents and Prospective Parents, and placed it on the Register of Prohibited Publications – Books (pictured above left).…