In 1964 the Johns Committee, chaired by State Senator Charley
Johns, published a piece of propaganda titled Homosexuality and Citizenship in Florida: A Report of the Florida Legislative
Committee, aimed at addressing “the growing problem of homosexuality” in
Florida. The booklet, referred to as the
“Purple Pamphlet,” because of its purple cover, had an original printing of
2000 copies and was initially disseminated to politicians, news outlets, and
state administrators. It eventually
ended up being sold as a pornographic narrative in New York, which prompted
legislators to halt further funding as mailing pornographic works was in
violation of the Comstock Act.
Charley Johns (center)
The authors of the “Purple Pamphlet” equate homosexuality
with pedophilia, reporting that gay men suffer from an “addiction to youth,” as
is sadly often the custom, and state that homosexuals, specifically gay men
versus lesbians, are generally incapable of long-term monogamous relationships.
The report goes on to explain that the
Department of Correction has put together plans for the creation of a “treatment
center ‘for the care of child molesters and criminal sexual psychopaths,’” as
well as stripping known homosexuals of teaching privileges, having removed 64
educators from the classroom between 1959 and 1964, with 83 undecided cases. The “Purple Pamphlet” goes on to outline a
plan to save Floridians from the scourge of homosexuality and follows that with
not only an extensive list of terms for “homosexual or deviate behaviors,” but
more disturbingly, sexual photos of very young males. It begs the question, who is in fact the
deviant in this scenario.
Until 1993 the Johns Committee Records remained sealed. In the past three decades scholars have been
pouring over them, in an attempt to understand the Committee’s policies and
methods and the impetus of the Johns Committee to combine civil rights leaders,
homosexuals, and communists under one seditious umbrella, resulting in several
articles and books, as well as three documentaries.
Additional Sources:
Judith G. Poucher. 2014. “The Johns Committee: A Historiographic
Essay.” The
Florida Historical Quarterly, no. 1: 74.
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