Ulysses has not only made history as a modernist masterpiece. The so-called Woolsey Decision of 1933 also constitutes an important legal precedent.
A Deliberate Provocation
In the U.S., Ulysses was banned in February 1921, when a court ruling declared the book obscene. However, when customs officials seized a copy of Ulysses in 1932, it wasn’t a mere coincidence. In fact, the publisher Bennet Cerf and the lawyer Morris L. Ernst in New York, together with Joyce’s friend Paul Léon in Paris, had devised a detailed plan plan to provoke a new trial.
Part of their plan was for Léon to mail not just a copy of Ulysses to the U.S., but to add a series of reviews that praised the novel for its literary merits and moral stature. Meanwhile, Ernst’s office informed customs officials that a copy of the banned book was on its way to New York.
A Groundbreaking Verdict
The plan worked. U.S. attorney George Z. Medalie filed charges, and the hoped-for trial was scheduled for the following year. The judge in United States v. One Book Entitled Ulysses was John M. Woolsey, himself a lover of literature.
In his verdict, Woolsey implicitly rejected the so-called Hicklin test, which derived from a 1868 precedent case. Instead, he formulated a new basis for judging material suspected of being obscene. First, one was to judge the material at hand not with a view to those who were most susceptible to corrupting influences but based on the average person. Second, it was paramount to consider the overall intention of the work in question.
Accordingly, a book could only be deemed obscene if its overall purpose was to provoke sexual arousal. The U.S. attorney’s office appealed Woolsey’s decision, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second District agreed that Ulysses could not be considered obscene. Since that time, self-appointed moral guardians in the U.S. have found it harder to remove artworks from circulation by means of a court order.
Table of Contents
- James Joyce, Ulysses, and the Law: An Introduction
- Obscenity and Literature: Legal Context around 1915
- James, Nora, and the “Konkubinatsverbot”
- Adultery as a Crime of Property
- Doubt as a Virtue
- Joyce Files a Lawsuit in Zurich
- Dying Without a Safety Net
- Ulysses Outlawed in the U.S.
- A Victory for Free Speech
- Suicide as a Crime
- A Difficult Return: Stricter Migration Laws
- A Defamation Case Against the BBC
Sources: Birmingham, Kevin. “The Prestige of the Law: Revisiting Obscenity Law and Judge Woolsey’s Ulysses Decision.” Joyce and the Law, edited by Jonathan Goldman, UP of Florida, 2017, pp. 228–245. | Spoo, Robert. “Ulysses as Deodand: Books, Automobiles, and the Law of Forfeiture.” Joyce and the Law, edited by Jonathan Goldman, UP of Florida, 2017, pp. 246–261.
