The Sedition Act of 1798: Silencing Dissent and Sparking Resistance
The Sedition Act of 1798 marked one of the most extreme restrictions on free speech in American history, criminalizing criticism of the government and making it illegal to publish anything that could “bring them or either of them into contempt or disrepute.” The law...
Whose Job is it to Keep the Feds in Line?
For the federal government to take even a “single step” beyond the limits of the Constitution, Thomas Jefferson wrote, “is to take possession of a boundless field of power, no longer susceptible of any definition.” The “detestable precedent” is how John Dickinson...
The Founders Predicted our Economic Crisis
Did Thomas Jefferson call the economic crisis? “Every thing predicted by the enemies of banks, in the beginning, is now coming to pass. we are to be ruined now by the deluge of bank paper as we were formerly by the old Continental paper.” That’s from a letter to...