diff --git a/libs/pbd/pbd.cc b/libs/pbd/pbd.cc
index 8b55692e80..89147324d8 100644
--- a/libs/pbd/pbd.cc
+++ b/libs/pbd/pbd.cc
@@ -131,14 +131,6 @@ PBD::init ()
 
 	set_debug_options_from_env ();
 
-	/* this call is made by any call to XMLTree::read() and its cousins. It
-	   sets the handling of blank space to match the libxml2 standard,
-	   rather than the libxml1 version. Without this, the behavior is
-	   defined by whoever calls it first.
-	*/
-
-	xmlKeepBlanksDefault (0);
-
 	libpbd_initialized = true;
 	return true;
 }