The Battle Against the Ghost of Comstock

There are some folks who, upon encountering a rickety old fence in the wilderness, will tip their hat, step over it, and go about their business. Then there are others who, upon seeing the museum piece, will whip out a hammer, rally a crowd, and commence hollering about how the fate of civilization hangs upon its removal.

And so, it appears U.S. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto has taken a firm position in the latter camp.

Alongside two dozen of her esteemed colleagues, the Senator has taken up arms against the specter of the Comstock Act—a relic of the 19th century that once forbade mailing anything a prudish government agent might deem offensive. The fact that this particular law has spent the last hundred years gathering dust in some forgotten corner of the legal archives does not trouble Cortez Masto. Indeed, she warns in dire tones that Republican forces are sharpening it into a weapon of tyranny, poised to strike at modern reproductive rights.

“Anti-choice Republicans have made it clear they want to use this 150-year-old law to enact a national abortion ban – even without the support of Congress or the American people,” she declared as if Anthony Comstock himself had risen from the grave, frothing at the mouth and demanding fealty to his puritanical crusade.

And so, the Senator presents the Stop Comstock Act, a noble effort to slay this legal ghost before it can haunt the nation anew. Whether this effort will amount to a necessary safeguard or merely a spectacle of political shadowboxing remains to be seen.

But one must admire the energy with which some politicians can kick up a dust storm where nary a tumbleweed stirred before.