Comics Code Authority
The CC formation followed a moral panic centered around a series of Senate hearings and the publication of psychiatrist Fredric Wertham's book Seduction of the Innocent.
Members submitted comics to the CCA, which screened them for adherence to its code, then authorized the use of their seal on the cover if the book was found to be in compliance.
[6] It named New York magistrate Charles F. Murphy (1920–1992), a specialist in juvenile delinquency, to head the organization and devise a self-policing "code of ethics and standards" for the industry.
[6] In his introduction to Archie Americana Series Best of the Fifties, editor Victor Gorelick reminisced about the code, writing, "My first assignment, as a new art assistant, was to remove cleavages and lift up low cut blouses on Katy Keene.
[11] However, two major publishers of comics–Dell Comics and Gold Key Comics–did not display the seal, because their output was subject to a higher authority: their licensors which included Walt Disney and the producers of many TV shows aimed at children.
"[17] In one early confrontation between a comic-book publisher and the code authorities, EC Comics' William Gaines reprinted the story "Judgment Day", from the pre-code Weird Fantasy #18 (April 1953), in Incredible Science Fiction #33 (February 1956).
[18] The story, by writer Al Feldstein and artist Joe Orlando,[19] was an allegory against racial prejudice, a point which was necessarily nullified if the lead character was not black.
[18] The following shows the complete Code as it stood in 1954:[21] Writer Marv Wolfman's name was briefly a point of contention between DC Comics and the CCA.
In the supernatural-mystery anthology House of Secrets #83 (Jan. 1970), the book's host introduces the story "The Stuff that Dreams are Made of" as one told to him by "a wandering wolfman".
Around this time, the United States Department of Health, Education and Welfare approached Marvel Comics editor-in-chief Stan Lee to do a story about drug abuse.
[25] However, Code administrator Leonard Darvin "was ill" at the time of the Spider-Man story,[18] and acting administrator John L. Goldwater (publisher of Archie Comics) refused to grant Code approval because of the depiction of narcotics being used, regardless of the context,[18] whereas the Deadman story had depicted only a wholesale business transaction.
"That was the only big issue that we had" with the Code, Lee recalled in a 1998 interview: I could understand them; they were like lawyers, people who take things literally and technically.
[18] As a result of publicity surrounding the Department of Health, Education and Welfare's sanctioning of the storyline, however, the CCA revised the Code to permit the depiction of "narcotics or drug addiction" if presented "as a vicious habit".
Some subsequent DC series, including Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns (1986), launched without ever receiving the CCA Seal of approval.
Archie Comics President Mike Pellerito said that the code did not affect his company the way that it did others as "we aren't about to start stuffing bodies into refrigerators.
[35][36] The vast majority of advertisers had ceased making decisions on the basis of the CCA stamp over the past few years, according to a January 24, 2011 Newsarama report.
[40] Binge Books announced that it had used the seal on the one-shot comic Heroes Union, produced by Roger Stern, Ron Frenz, and Sal Buscema in May 2021.
