Founders' Quotes - Alien and Sedition Act

The growth of the federal government concerns every citizen of this Republic. At one time the States fought for their liberty; now they fight for their share of federal funding.

The Alien and Sedition Acts brought protests from the States, the likes of which would warm our hearts in today's political arena. I thought some of you may like this diversion from the normal short quotes that I usually post (and will later this week).

SECTION 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, That if any persons shall unlawfully combine or conspire together, with intent to oppose any measure or measures of the government of the United States, which are or shall be directed by proper authority, or to impede the operation of any law of the United States, or to intimidate or prevent any person holding a place or office in or under the government of the United States, from undertaking, performing or executing his trust or duty, and if any person or persons, with intent as aforesaid, shall counsel, advise or attempt to procure any insurrection, riot, unlawful assembly, or combination, whether such conspiracy, threatening, counsel, advice, or attempt shall have the proposed effect or not, he or they shall be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor, and on conviction, before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding five thousand dollars, and by imprisonment during a term not less than six months nor exceeding five years; and further, at the discretion of the court may be ho]den to find sureties for his good behaviour in such sum, and for such time, as the said court may direct.

SEC. 2. And be it farther enacted, That if any person shall write, print, utter or publish, or shall cause or procure to be written, printed, uttered or published, or shall knowingly and willingly assist or aid in writing, printing, uttering or publishing any false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress of the United States, or the President of the United States, with intent to defame the said government, or either house of the said Congress, or the said President, or to bring them, or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them, or either or any of them, the hatred of the good people of the United States, or to stir up sedition within the United States, or to excite any unlawful combinations therein, for opposing or resisting any law of the United States, or any act of the President of the United States, done in pursuance of any such law, or of the powers in him vested by the constitution of the United States, or to resist, oppose, or defeat any such law or act, or to aid, encourage or abet any hostile designs of any foreign nation against United States, their people or government, then such person, being thereof convicted before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment not exceeding two years.

SEC. 3. And be it further enacted and declared, That if any person shall be prosecuted under this act, for the writing or publishing any libel aforesaid, it shall be lawful for the defendant, upon the trial of the cause, to give in evidence in his defence, the truth of the matter contained in Republication charged as a libel. And the jury who shall try the cause, shall have a right to determine the law and the fact, under the direction of the court, as in other cases.

SEC. 4. And be it further enacted, That this act shall continue and be in force until the third day of March, one thousand eight hundred and one, and no longer: Provided, that the expiration of the act shall not prevent or defeat a prosecution and punishment of any offence against the law, during the time it shall be in force.

The Sedition Act's violations of the First Amendment were obvious. But the enactment of this law led to the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions (authored by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison), parts of which I now highlight (with emphasis). It is important to note how the States fought the federal government's new quest for power over the States:

RESOLVED, That this commonwealth considers the federal union, upon the terms and for the purposes specified in the late compact, as conducive to the liberty and happiness of the several states: That it does now unequivocally declare its attachment to the Union, and to that compact, agreeable to its obvious and real intention, and will be among the last to seek its dissolution: That if those who administer the general government be permitted to transgress the limits fixed by that compact, by a total disregard to the special delegations of power therein contained, annihilation of the state governments, and the erection upon their ruins, of a general consolidated government, will be the inevitable consequence:

That this Assembly doth explicitly and peremptorily declare, that it views the powers of the federal government, as resulting from the compact, to which the states are parties; as limited by the plain sense and intention of the instrument constituting the compact; as no further valid that they are authorized by the grants enumerated in that compact; and that in case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of other powers, not granted by the said compact, the states who are parties thereto, have the right, and are in duty bound, to interpose for arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining within their respective limits, the authorities, rights and liberties appertaining to them.

That the General Assembly doth particularly protest against the palpable and alarming infractions of the Constitution, in the two late cases of the "Alien and Sedition Acts" passed at the last session of Congress; the first of which exercises a power no where delegated to the federal government, and which by uniting legislative and judicial powers to those of executive, subverts the general principles of free government; as well as the particular organization, and positive provisions of the federal constitution; and the other of which acts, exercises in like manner, a power not delegated by the constitution, but on the contrary, expressly and positively forbidden by one of the amendments thererto; a power, which more than any other, ought to produce universal alarm, because it is levelled against that right of freely examining public characters and measures, and of free communication among the people thereon, which has ever been justly deemed, the only effectual guardian of every other right.

That this state having by its Convention, which ratified the federal Constitution, expressly declared, that among other essential rights, "the Liberty of Conscience and of the Press cannot be cancelled, abridged, restrained, or modified by any authority of the United States," and from its extreme anxiety to guard these rights from every possible attack of sophistry or ambition, having with other states, recommended an amendment for that purpose, which amendment was, in due time, annexed to the Constitution; it would mark a reproachable inconsistency, and criminal degeneracy, if an indifference were now shewn, to the most palpable violation of one of the Rights, thus declared and secured; and to the establishment of a precedent which may be fatal to the other.

While searching for items in this day's edition, I found a this posting on a FreeRepublic thread from 1994, or 1995....the dates are strange.

After one of my Starbucks chats I understand that many people do not understand the concept of the Republican form of government guaranteed by Article IV, Section 4 of our Constitution. The idea that States should have power in dealing with the Federal Government is something that few students fail to grasp. I thought this issue was important. I hope you like it.

“The Sedition Act's violations of the First Amendment were obvious. But the enactment of this law led to the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions (authored by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison), parts of which I now highlight (with emphasis). It is important to note how the States fought the federal government's new quest for power over the States:”

Jefferson had no problem restricting the freedom of the press as long as it was done at the state level rather than at the Federal level. He was a political civil rights advocate when it suited him....e.g., attempting to railroad Burr for treason. Watch what he did rather than what he said.
Also Jefferson, Madison and Monroe were States Right advocates; whose beliefs ultimately resulted in Lincoln's war on the southern states.

“...That if any person shall write, print, utter or publish, or shall cause or procure to be written, printed, uttered or published, or shall knowingly and willingly assist or aid in writing, printing, uttering or publishing any false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress of the United States, or the President of the United States, with intent to defame the said government, or either house of the said Congress, or the said President, or to bring them, or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them, or either or any of them, the hatred of the good people of the United States, or to stir up sedition within the United States, or to excite any unlawful combinations therein, for opposing or resisting any law of the United States, or any act of the President of the United States, done in pursuance of any such law, or of the powers in him vested by the constitution of the United States, or to resist, oppose, or defeat any such law or act, or to aid, encourage or abet any hostile designs of any foreign nation against United States, their people or government, then such person, being thereof convicted before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment not exceeding two years.”

Sounds like a plank of the dumbles platform for the “fairness doctrine”

Madison was on both sides of this issue over the years. He started out with Hamilton favoring a greater national sovereignty. He switched to Jefferson's position in favor of states' rights in the controversy over the Alien and Sedition Acts. Then he went right back to his old position during the South Carolina Nullification Crisis. In the last years of his life, Madison burned papers left and right to try and obscure the paper trail and create the impression that he had been consistent over the years.

Once the nullification crisis had passed and tempers had cooled, Madison wrote a pamphlet, also published in many newspapers, refuting John Calhoun's doctrines of interposition and nulliication. He offered Calhoun the opportunity to respond and debate the issue together in the press. Calhoun dismissed Madison as senile and said he would not engage in a battle of wits with a half-armed man. This was unfortunate. The post-crisis debate between Calhoun and Webster had aleady taken place. A debate in the press between Calhoun and Madison would have had a salutary effect on defining the states' rights issue.

I still strongly recommend that FReepers read Forrest McDonald's classis States' Rights and the Union, which is his masterpiece.

In January 1800 James Madison headed the US House of Representatives committee that traveled to the Virginia State legislature after both Virginia and Kentucky petitioned the new federal government that the recent Alien and Sedition Act was unconstitutional.

At the conclusion of that visit, Madison submitted this report:

The resolution declares, first, that "it views the powers of the federal government as resulting from the compact to which the states are parties;" in other words, that the federal powers are derived from the Constitution; and that the Constitution is a compact to which the states are parties. Clear as the position must seem, that the federal powers are derived from the Constitution, and from that alone, the committee are not unapprised of a late doctrine which opens another source of federal powers, not less extensive and important than it is new and unexpected. The examination of this doctrine will be most conveniently connected with a review of a succeeding resolution. The committee satisfy themselves here with briefly remarking that, in all the contemporary discussions and comments which the Constitution underwent, it was constantly justified and recommended on the ground that the powers not given to the government were withheld from it; and that, if any doubt could have existed on this subject, under the original text of the Constitution, it is removed, as far as words could remove it, by the 12th amendment, now a part of the Constitution, which expressly declares, "that the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people."

Madison made in quite clear he believed the general government had overstepped its bounds.

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In that report is also contained this little nugget on what was the original intent concerning the limited authority of the US Supreme Court:

(snip)
However true, therefore, it may be, that the judicial department is, in all questions submitted to it by the forms of the Constitution, to decide in the last resort, this resort must necessarily be deemed the last in relation to the authorities of the other departments of the government; not in relation to the rights of the parties to the constitutional compact, from which the judicial, as well as the other departments, hold their delegated trusts. On any other hypothesis, the delegation of judicial power would annul the authority delegating it; and the concurrence of this department with the others in usurped powers, might subvert forever, and beyond the possible reach of any rightful remedy, the very Constitution which all were instituted to preserve.

James Madison, Report on the Virginia Resolutions

I have often wondered why the Founders knew so much about improper government.

In the years after the British went home in 1783, James Madison, always a student of history, decided to study the events and issues that had destroyed previous republics in human history. He put together a journal, titled Vices of Republics, that has come down to us as James Madison's Vices, a hilarious title because he had fewer vices than anyone of that era who served in government.

In their book, Decision in Philadelphia, the Colliers go into this at some length. Madison's research was critical in the design and content of the Constitution.

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