Hays Office

Hays Office, American organization that promulgated a moral code for films. In 1922, after a number of scandals involving Hollywood personalities, film industry leaders formed the organization to counteract the threat of government censorship and to create favorable publicity for the industry. Under Will H. Hays, a politically active lawyer, the Hays Office initiated a blacklist, inserted morals clauses into actors’ contracts, and in 1930 developed the Motion Picture Production Code, which detailed what was morally acceptable on the screen. The code was supplanted in 1966 by a voluntary rating system.