Date of Award

2014

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelors

Department

Social Sciences

First Advisor

Goff, Brendan

Keywords

Sedition Act, United States, Congress

Area of Concentration

General Studies

Abstract

The First Amendment of the United States Constitution guarantees freedom of the press. However, there is evidence that many of the founders did not actually understand “freedom of the press” as the right to criticize the government in print, and did not believe that the Constitution could protect a disobedient press. The right to embarrass the government was not fully understood as a formal civil right in the eighteenth century. It only became one through constitutional innovation. This thesis will analyze two interpretations of “freedom of the press” which emerged during the Sedition Act controversy of 1798-1800, and their origins in the doctrines of strict and broad construction. The Sedition Act authorized the United States government to take legal action against printers who criticized its policies. The Federalist Party supported the new law, and argued that “freedom of the press” did not extend to the right to criticize Congress. The Democratic-Republicans opposed Congress’s right to pass a Sedition Act, but asserted the right of individual state governments to control the press. Therefore, neither party wanted the First Amendment to protect a newspaper from legal reprisals if it discredited the legitimate government. Their contest was more accurately over whether Congress was the “legitimate government.”

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