Editing Committee on Evil Literature (section)

{{Short description|1926 Irish Censorship Enquiry}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{more citations needed|date=December 2013}}
The '''Committee on Evil Literature''' was a committee set up by the [[Irish Free State]]'s Department of Justice in 1926 to look into censorship of printed matter.

After independence in 1922, the authorities of the Irish Free State came under increasing pressure to ban materials considered obscene or liable to corrupt public morals. In October 1925, the Minister for Justice, [[Kevin O'Higgins]], told ''[[Dáil Éireann]]'' that existing [[obscenity]] laws were sufficient and the government had no right to further interfere with people's personal freedom. He received heavy criticism for these remarks and mounting public pressure persuaded him, on 12 February 1926, to appoint a departmental committee, the Committee on Evil Literature, to consider and report "whether it is necessary or advisable in the interest of the public morality to extend the existing powers of the State to prohibit or restrict the sale and circulation of printed matter".