The Washington Post Mar 10, 1914
pg. 4
FILM AND STAGE RULE
Anti-Defamation League Urges District Censors Board
COMMISSIONERS TO GIVE AID
Chief Object of a Proposed Bill to Establish Such an Organization Here, Explains Simon Wolf, Is to Prevent Presentation of Characterizations Odious to Any Creed or Race.
A bill to establish a board of censorship for moving pictures and other stage characterizations In the District Is being drafted by Simon Wolf, president of the Washington branch of the National Anti-defamation League. The commissioners have assured Mr. Wolf, he said last night, that they will promtply forward the bill to Congress, with recommendation for its enactment. Indorsement of the YMCA and the Washington Truth Society is expected for the measure.
Bans Creed or Race Offense.
"The commissioners have explained," said Mr. Wolf, "that they are now powerless to appoint such a board of censorship as is desired. The Antidefamation League, which was organized In Chicago by members of the B'nal B'rith, has spread throughout the country, and includes in its membership many Christians, as well as Hebrews. Its object is to prevent the presentation in moving pictures or through other atage characterization of odious portrayals of any creed or race. Such power as have the Chicago board of censors and the Chicago police the league will seek to have created in the District. It is also desired to prevent the reading In the public schools of plays which tend to inflame children's minds or excite racial prejudice. Deep and lasting impressions are easily made on immature mentalities, and sometimes such childhood-gained views are well-nigh ineradicable."
Reading and Seeing Different
Asked if he objected to the study of "The Merchant of Venice" and its performance on the stage, Mr. Wolf replied that he believed it ought not be read in the schools, but that its performance in a theater was a different question.
"The ideas gained from the reading and seeing of that play," he declared, "are quite different."
The Antldefamation League's committee to urge the enactment of the censorship bill include Mr. Wolf, the Rev. Abram Simon, Julius I. Peyser, and A. D. Marks. On a similar committee for the Washington Truth Society are W. H. DeLacy, William Cleary Sullivan, P. T. Moran, the Rev. Eugene de L. McDonnell and Francis de S. Ryan.