Horror Comics

Of the 80 million comic books sold in the U.S. and Canada every month, about a quarter are what the trade calls "horror comics." They deserve the title. Last week, in Manhattan, the comic-book publishing center of the U.S., a three-man Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency began an investigation to find out "the impact upon adolescents" of horror comic books. The committee never found out exactly what the impact is, but it did get some interesting testimony on how comic books are distributed.

Up before the committee stepped William Richter, counsel for the Newsdealers Association of Greater New York, which represents more than 1,000 newsstands and stationery stores. Crime-and-horror comics, said Richter, are forced by the distributors on many newsstand dealers who do not want to sell them. They are often included in the same wired bundles with slick-paper magazines, even though they have not been ordered. If the retailer returns an "unreasonable amount," said Richter, "he can be cut off completely" from his supply of fast-selling, popular magazines.

In defense of the crime books. Publisher (Entertaining Comics Group) William Gaines opposed any censorship, on the ground that the publishers themselves are best qualified to decide what is "good taste." Tennessee's Democratic Senator Estes Kefauver drily asked whether Publisher Gaines considered "good taste" a comic-book cover showing an ax-wielding man holding aloft the severed head of a blonde. Answered Gaines: "Yes, I do—for the cover of a horror comic. I think it would be in bad taste if the head were held a little higher so the neck would show with the blood dripping out." Said Senator Kefauver: "You've got blood dripping from the mouth."

Senator Kefauver went on to criticize the Child Study Association of America, after learning that three members of the group were on the payrolls of the comicbook publishers. Charged Kefauver: "You have deceived the public ... by putting out advice to parents with the principal research and writing done by people in the pay of publishers, and you do not divulge these facts."