After independence in 1922, the authorities of the Irish Free State came under increasing pressure to ban materials considered obscene or liable to corrupt public morals.
In October 1925, the Minister for Justice, Kevin O'Higgins, told Dáil Éireann that existing obscenity laws were sufficient and the government had no right to further interfere with people's personal freedom.
He received heavy criticism for these remarks and mounting public pressure persuaded him, on 12 February 1926, to appoint a departmental committee, the Committee on Evil Literature, to consider and report "whether it is necessary or advisable in the interest of the public morality to extend the existing powers of the State to prohibit or restrict the sale and circulation of printed matter".
Publications that the Roman Catholic Church considered to be obscene included the newspapers News of the World, The People, Sunday Chronicle and Daily Mail, and the magazines Vogue, Woman's Weekly, Woman's World, Illustrated Police News and most girls' picture papers.
[citation needed] The objection to the more populist newspapers appears to have been that their detailed reporting of murders and other violent crimes depraved the readers.