United States Congress Quotes
… if any person shall write, print, utter or publish, or shall cause or procure to be written, printed, uttered or published, or shall knowingly and willingly assist or aid in writing, printing, uttering or publishing any false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress of the United States, or the President of the United States, with intent to defame the said government, or either house of the said Congress, or the said President, or to bring them, or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them … the hatred of the good people of the United States, or to stir up sedition within the United States, or to excite any unlawful combinations therein, for opposing or resisting any law of the United States, or any act of the President of the United States, done in pursuance of any such law, or of the powers in him vested by the constitution of the United States, or to resist, oppose, or defeat any such law or act, or to aid, encourage or abet any hostile designs of any foreign nation against United States, their people or government, then such person, being thereof convicted before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment not exceeding two years.
This law would certainly be held unconstitutional today but at the time it wasn’t even clear that the Supreme Court could nullify a law of Congress. Virginia and Kentucky both passed resolutions however, protesting the law and challenging its constitutionality. The $2,000 maximum fine was huge for the day—the equivalent of more than $1 million today. The reason was that one of the major targets of the law was wealthy printers and publishers, who could be impoverished for a violation. The Sedition Act was in existence until Jefferson ousted the Federalists who passed it (John Adams signed it) and pardoned all those who had been convicted under the law. The Sedition Act is used today as evidence that the Founding Fathers really did not intend that the First Amendment protect speech that is potentially harmful to the country. The counter argument is that the Sedition Act was passed by John Adams and his allies at a particularly vulnerable time in America’s early history. And it was one of the biggest reasons that Adams and the Federalists were defeated after a single term by Thomas Jefferson and the Democrats. The Federalists were so badly beaten that their entire political party was destroyed. The Whig Party evolved as the opposition Party to Jefferson and the Democrats.
US Congress, The Sedition Act, July 14, 1798
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Striking down a law making cross burning a crime:
This law, passed by the President John Adams and the Federalists, became the political factor around which Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and others were to create the Democratic Republicans who not only ousted the Federalists but beat them so badly that the party disappeared and the Whig Party evolved. Under this law a person who criticized any facet of the Government publicly could be fined and imprisoned. The Act was unconstitutional but at that early stage of America, there were no Supreme Court precedents to go by and the power of the courts to nullify a law of Congress was not even clear. So it was never tested in the courts but finally was repealed.
Usually Jefferson was the strongest voice for rights with no loopholes. However, he wanted to have a slander exception as this quote shows. However, the issue is what happens if a government official or an agency believed that it has been falsely slandered? If Jefferson’s proposal was accepted completely, the government and officials could sue someone who published negative information that they thought was false. Our supreme court has limited the exception to private parties who were NOT “public figures” unless the publisher knew the information was false and proceeded anyway for malicious reasons.
England and most other countries do not have such an exception and the press is very timid about criticizing the government or officials lest they make a mistake .
The word “printer” had a slightly different meaning then. In Jefferson’s time the printer was also the publisher, Benjamin Franklin was known as a printer but he not only published material but wrote much of it himself. This was typical. So Jefferson is concerned with the rights of the printer, the publisher and the writer.
This principle was incorporated into American law by the Supreme Court 1964 decision in Sullivan v. New York Times, where this argument drove the opinion.
The article showed how a nuclear bomb worked. The Government attempted to suppress the publication by getting a Federal court injunction. Day and others claimed the article was based on public sources. It was. The U. S. Court of Appeals lifted the injunction and the article was published.
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States consisting of two chambers: the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the Capitol in Washington, D.C. Both senators and representatives are chosen through direct election, though vacancies in the Senate may be filled by a gubernatorial appointment. Members are usually affiliated to the Republican Party or to the Democratic Party, and only rarely to a third party or as independents. Congress has 535 voting members: 435 Representatives and 100 Senators.; A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different nations, constituent states, independent organizations, or groups.
