{"product_id":"9780190461621-secondhand-press-and-speech-under-assault-the-early-supreme-court-justices-the","title":"Press and Speech Under Assault: The Early Supreme Court Justices, the","description":"The early Supreme Court justices wrestled with how much press and speech is protected by freedoms of press and speech, before and under the First Amendment, and with whether the Sedition Act of 1798 violated those freedoms. This book discusses the twelve Supreme Court justices before John Marshall, their views of liberties of press and speech, and the Sedition Act prosecutions over which some of them presided.\nThe book begins with the views\nof the pre-Marshall justices about freedoms of press and speech, before the struggle over the Sedition Act. It finds that their understanding was strikingly more expansive than the narrow definition of\nSir William Blackstone, which is usually assumed to have dominated the period. Not one justice of the Supreme Court adopted that narrow definition before 1798, and all expressed strong commitments to those freedoms.\nThe book then discusses the views of the early Supreme Court justices about freedoms of press and speech during the national controversy over the Sedition Act of 1798 and its constitutionality. It finds that, though several of the justices presided over\nSedition Act trials, the early justices divided almost evenly over that issue with an unrecognized half opposing its constitutionality, rather than unanimously supporting the Act as is generally assumed.\nThe book similarly reassesses the Federalist party itself, and finds that an unrecognized minority also challenged the constitutionality of the Sedition Act and the narrow Blackstone approach during 1798-1801, and that an unrecognized minority of the other states did as well in considering the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions.\nThe book summarizes the recognized fourteen prosecutions of newspaper editors and other opposition members under the Sedition Act of 1798. It\nsheds new light on the recognized cases by identifying and confirming twenty-two additional Sedition Act prosecutions.\nAt each of these steps, this book challenges conventional\nviews in existing histories of the early republic and of the early Supreme Court justices.","brand":"Secondhand Stock","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50555708637403,"sku":"9780190461621-SECONDHAND","price":25.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0523\/7646\/9701\/files\/c7aadaef-b8a5-46ed-a547-61a453858b40.jpg?v=1790951876","url":"https:\/\/bookgrocer.com\/products\/9780190461621-secondhand-press-and-speech-under-assault-the-early-supreme-court-justices-the","provider":"Book Grocer","version":"1.0","type":"link"}