Headquarters of the Censorship Services / “Prior Examination” (1969-1974)

Prior censorship of the press lasted throughout the dictatorship and moved house several times, always along the Carmo–Bairro Alto–Restauradores axis, close to the newsrooms. The researcher Joaquim Cardoso Gomes identified its successive headquarters: the GNR’s Carmo Barracks (from 22 June 1926 to 1934); Rua Nova da Trindade, 62, first floor (1934-1943, a building that no longer exists); Largo Trindade Coelho, 9, first floor (1943-1947/48); Calçada da Glória, 9, second floor, in the Palácio Foz building (1947/48-1961); Rua de São Pedro de Alcântara, 45, second floor (11 June 1961-1968, with proofs delivered via Rua do Diário de Notícias, 150; the magazine JJ illustrates it with the Palácio Ludovice, which also housed the National Propaganda Secretariat, SPN); Rua de São Pedro de Alcântara, 81, ground floor (11 December 1968-1969); and, finally, Rua da Misericórdia, 125, first floor, from 22 September 1969.

Newspapers sent their page proofs by messenger and got them back stamped “Vetted by the Censorship” (Visado pela Censura) — the “blue pencil”, as censorship came to be known. The structure was small — some 70 to 90 censors and 30 assistants, a tenth the size of the PIDE/DGS, according to Cardoso Gomes — but it shaped all information. In 1972 the services were renamed “Prior Examination”, with no change in practice.

Many texts by women fell foul of this sieve: Diana Andringa, when she worked at Vida Mundial, had an article on the colonial war in Angola cut; Maria Teresa Horta’s Minha Senhora de Mim (My Lady of Myself, 1971) was seized by the PIDE; and the Novas Cartas Portuguesas (New Portuguese Letters, 1972) were withdrawn from circulation shortly after publication and took their authors to court. The silence imposed on the newspapers about that case was such that, at one point, not even the date and time of the hearings could be reported.

Opposite, across the street, were the offices of República, the daily most closely identified with the opposition. On 25 April 1974, the paper came out with the line “This newspaper has not been vetted by any Censorship Commission” (Este jornal não foi visado por qualquer Comissão de Censura), and the censors abandoned the premises to the crowd. On the morning of the 26th the people stormed the headquarters; shortly before, the last man in charge, Mário Bento, had advised a colonel to “stay put and keep quiet”.