...extreme, sanctioned a fine of up to $2,000 and imprisonment up to two years for persons convicted of publishing "any false, scandalous and malicious writing...writings against the government of the United States . . . Congress . . . the President . . . with intent to defame the said government ... or to bring...

...opposition's newspapers. It read, as Madison quoted in his report on the Virginia Resolutions (1799): "If any person shall write, print, utter, or publish,...writings against the Government of the United States, or the President of the United States, with an intent to defame the said Government or either house...

...or measures of the government of the United States"; or counseling or advising such opposition; or writing, printing, uttering, or publishing "any false,...writings against the government of the United States, or the President of the United States with intent to defame ... or to bring them or either of them,...

...is as follows, to wit : " And be it further enacted, That if any person shall write, print, utteror publish, or shall cause or procure to be written,...printed, uttered, or published, or shall knowingly and wilfully assist or aid in writing, printing, uttering, or publishing, any false, scandalous, and malicious...

...such as he suspects of treasonable machinations. The Sedition Act punished with fine and imprisonment "any false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States . . . with intent to defame the said government." It was a republican government's version of lese...

...and at least two Republican newspapers were shut down.152 The law made it a crime to utter or publish "any false, scandalous, and malicious writing or writings against the Government of the United States, with intent to defame ... or to bring them into contempt or disrepute."1'3 Not only was a congressman,...

...every sort. By 1798 the government had had enough; Congress passed the Sedition Law, an act to punish "any false, scandalous, and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States."1i Under the Sedition Law twenty-five persons were arrested, ten tried, and ten convicted —...

...misdemeanor and subject to a fine and imprisonment. The second section concerned sedition, defined as "false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States . . . with intent to defame" it or bring it into "contempt or disrepute" so as to excite "the hatred...

...sedition, including speech or writing that advocated such sedition. Section 2 proscribed seditious libel: That if any person shall write, print, utter, or publish,...writing or writings against the government of the I hiked States, or either house of the said Congress or the said President, or to bring them, or either...

...minority, the Sedition Act affected the citizen majority. It became a federal crime to utter or publish "any false, scandalous, and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States or the President of the United States, with intent to defame ... or to bring them into contempt or...