letters along with a passage from the Old Testament, which portrayed incest, harlotry, and coitus interruptus . He did this in the hope of having the Bible declared obscene. (His efforts carne to naught. Not until 1895, when J. B.
Wise mailed a postcard inscribed with a salty verse, was the Bible declared legally obscene.) The charges sprang from a policy Moses Harman had initiated in the spring of 1886 . Harman vowed not to edit letters sent to Lucifer because of the language they contained. Although Harman did not agree with everything he printed, he thought free speech vented whatever evil lay in the hearts of men and women.
In the June 18 issue, a letter appeared from a Tennessee doctor, W. G. Markland. Because of its historical importance the Markland letter is quoted here extensively: EDS. LUCIFER: To-day's mail brought me a letter from a dear lady friend, from which I quote and query:
"About a year ago F--- gave birth to a babe, and was severely torn by the use of instruments in incompetent hands. She has gone through three operations and all failed. I 44
brought her home and had Drs. ---and---operate on her, and she was getting along nicely until last night, when her husband came down, forced himself into her bed and the stitches were torn from her healing flesh, leaving her in a worse condition than ever. I don't know what to do....
"Laws are made for the protection of life, person and property.
"Will you point to a law that will punish this brute? Was his conduct illegal? The marriage license was a permit of the people at large given by their agent for this man and woman-a mere child-to marry.
"Marry for what? Business? That he may have a housekeeper? He could legally have hired her for that. Save one thing, is there anything a man and woman can do for each other which they may not legally do without marrying?
"Is not that one thing copulation? Does the law interfere in any other relations of service between the sexes?
"What is rape? Is it not coition with a woman by force, not having a legal right?
"Can there be legal rape? Did this man rape his wife?
"Would it have been rape had he not been married to her?
"Does the law protect the person of woman in marriage? Does it protect her person out of marriage? Does not the question of rape turn on the pivot of legal right regardless of consequences?
"If a man stabs his wife to death with a knife, does not the law hold him for murder?
"If he murders her with his penis, what does the law do?
"If the wife, to protect her life, stabs her husband with a knife, does the law hold her guiltless?
Can a Czar have more absolute power over a subject than a man has over the genitals of his wife?
"Is it not a fearful power? Would a kind, considerate husband feel robbed, feel his manhood emasculated, if deprived of this legal power?
"Does the safety of society depend upon a legal right which none but the coarse, selfish, ignorant brutal will assert and exercise? ...
"Has freedom gender? . . ."
W. G. Markland [13]
The second offending letter was a protest against contraceptives on the grounds that they removed an obstacle to husbands who wished to have sex: namely, the fear of another mouth to feed. The third letter retold an anecdote about a couple who thought the world was ending and, therefore, told each other about their sexual improprieties. A fourth one discussed the relative virtues of two methods of sexual abstinence.
For these obscenities, Moses and his son George were arrested. All charges were later dropped against George.
On February 14, 1890, the unrepentant Lucifer printed a letter from a New York physician that detailed the sexual abuses he had seen in the course of his practice. The doctor's graphic accounts included a description of a man who liked to perform oral sex on other men. The letter remains one of the few nineteenth-century journalistic discussions of oral sex.
Moses Harman was sentenced to serve five years in prison and to pay a $300
Wise mailed a postcard inscribed with a salty verse, was the Bible declared legally obscene.) The charges sprang from a policy Moses Harman had initiated in the spring of 1886 . Harman vowed not to edit letters sent to Lucifer because of the language they contained. Although Harman did not agree with everything he printed, he thought free speech vented whatever evil lay in the hearts of men and women.
In the June 18 issue, a letter appeared from a Tennessee doctor, W. G. Markland. Because of its historical importance the Markland letter is quoted here extensively: EDS. LUCIFER: To-day's mail brought me a letter from a dear lady friend, from which I quote and query:
"About a year ago F--- gave birth to a babe, and was severely torn by the use of instruments in incompetent hands. She has gone through three operations and all failed. I 44
brought her home and had Drs. ---and---operate on her, and she was getting along nicely until last night, when her husband came down, forced himself into her bed and the stitches were torn from her healing flesh, leaving her in a worse condition than ever. I don't know what to do....
"Laws are made for the protection of life, person and property.
"Will you point to a law that will punish this brute? Was his conduct illegal? The marriage license was a permit of the people at large given by their agent for this man and woman-a mere child-to marry.
"Marry for what? Business? That he may have a housekeeper? He could legally have hired her for that. Save one thing, is there anything a man and woman can do for each other which they may not legally do without marrying?
"Is not that one thing copulation? Does the law interfere in any other relations of service between the sexes?
"What is rape? Is it not coition with a woman by force, not having a legal right?
"Can there be legal rape? Did this man rape his wife?
"Would it have been rape had he not been married to her?
"Does the law protect the person of woman in marriage? Does it protect her person out of marriage? Does not the question of rape turn on the pivot of legal right regardless of consequences?
"If a man stabs his wife to death with a knife, does not the law hold him for murder?
"If he murders her with his penis, what does the law do?
"If the wife, to protect her life, stabs her husband with a knife, does the law hold her guiltless?
Can a Czar have more absolute power over a subject than a man has over the genitals of his wife?
"Is it not a fearful power? Would a kind, considerate husband feel robbed, feel his manhood emasculated, if deprived of this legal power?
"Does the safety of society depend upon a legal right which none but the coarse, selfish, ignorant brutal will assert and exercise? ...
"Has freedom gender? . . ."
W. G. Markland [13]
The second offending letter was a protest against contraceptives on the grounds that they removed an obstacle to husbands who wished to have sex: namely, the fear of another mouth to feed. The third letter retold an anecdote about a couple who thought the world was ending and, therefore, told each other about their sexual improprieties. A fourth one discussed the relative virtues of two methods of sexual abstinence.
For these obscenities, Moses and his son George were arrested. All charges were later dropped against George.
On February 14, 1890, the unrepentant Lucifer printed a letter from a New York physician that detailed the sexual abuses he had seen in the course of his practice. The doctor's graphic accounts included a description of a man who liked to perform oral sex on other men. The letter remains one of the few nineteenth-century journalistic discussions of oral sex.
Moses Harman was sentenced to serve five years in prison and to pay a $300
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