The Sedition Act of 1798 famously expired on March 3, 1801, and presupposed to punish false and malicious statements concerning the Federalist President John Adams and the majority-Federalist Congress, no longer concerning the Democratic-Republican Vice-President Thomas Jefferson. This is continuously discussed as proof of the Federalists’ partisanship in enacting the Act.
But what I hadn’t recognized for a very long time is that the Federalists attempted to reenact the Act in early 1801, when it will have outlawed grievance of the newly-elected Democratic-Republican President and Congress. The invoice was once defeated within the House by means of a 53-49 vote; just about all Federalists voted for it, and all Republicans voted towards it. The 4 Federalists who voted towards consisted of 1 (George Dent) who voted towards the 1798 Act, two who were not within the House for the 1798 Act vote, and one that was once within the House in 1798 however did not vote.
The Federalists’ mentioned arguments gave the impression mainly to be
- malicious falsehoods concerning the govt are unhealthy and nugatory and need to be suppressed,
- the Sedition Act had in truth been enforced correctly, and thus merited renewal, and
- the Act protects speech by means of restricting common-law seditious libel to falsehoods, and by means of solving a modest penalty for seditious libel.
There would possibly were some political posturing there, and in all probability the Federalists idea they’d to do that to stop fees of hypocrisy. They may additionally have idea they’d little to lose from the renewal, given the expectancy that the brand new management would no longer implement the legislation, given its militant hostility to the legislation up to now.
Still, it struck me as price noting. (I wrote about this again in 2009, however one thing I learn this morning simply jogged my memory of it, so I believed I’d point out it once more.)
#Federalists #Sedition #Act