Hays Code

Hays Code, cinematic code, a self-regulatory doctrine adopted by the cinema industry in the United States in the 1930s and 1940s that was finally abolished in the 1960s in favour of film classification. The Code was named after William H. Hays (1879-1954), US Postmaster-General in the Cabinet of President Warren Harding. He was appointed in 1922 by the American film industry based in Hollywood to head the new organization, the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America Inc. (MPPDA). The Hays Office, as it became known, created the Motion Picture Production Code of 1930, or the Hays Code. Its tasks involved censorship both before and after production, suggesting amendments to scripts and cuts to film. In 1934 the Code was revised in order to tighten its remit. The Hays Office became one of the strongest players in the film business, able to dictate the production and moral content for the industry.

The background mood was influenced by various scandals in Hollywood and a perceived loosening of morals. In 1921 there was the scandal involving film actor Roscoe Fatty Arbuckle, who was accused of the manslaughter of the young film actress Virginia Rappe. Other factors included the death from drugs of Universal actor Wallace Reid; the sexual innuendo inherent in the films of Mae West; the background lawlessness represented by the era of Prohibition; and so on.

The Code’s general principle stated that: “No picture shall be produced which will lower the standards of those who see it. Hence the sympathy of the audience should never be thrown to the side of the crime, wrong-doing, evil, or sin.”

The Code outlined what it considered tasteful in a number of areas: murder (“revenge in modern times shall not be justified”); passion (“excessive and lustful kissing…are not to be shown”); childbirth (“scenes of actual childbirth, in fact or in silhouette, are never to be presented”); profanity (“Hell, S.O.B., damn, Gawd…is forbidden”; Nudity: (“undressing scenes should be avoided”); religion (“ministers of religion should not be used as comic characters or as villains”); and dancing (“dances which emphasize indecent movements are to be regarded as obscene”).

Opponents of the Code argued that it stifled creativity and was too restrictive. The administration was terminated in 1945; in the more enlightened era of the 1960s, at a time when film-makers were testing the boundaries, the Code was felt to be unworkable and finally abolished by MPAA president Jack Valenti in 1966. Film ratings were introduced in the United States in 1968.

See also American Cinema; Film censorship.