Yates V United States, 354 Term Paper

Total Length: 2153 words ( 7 double-spaced pages)

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In my judgment, the statutory provisions on which these prosecutions are based, abridge freedom of speech, press and assembly in violation of the 1st Amendment" ("Black, J, Concurring in Part").

Hence, the Yates decision was a precursor of the things to come. In 1964, the Court declared in the New York Times v. Sullivan that public officials could not recover civil damages for libel unless they prove the libel was committed intentionally or with malice and held that making seditious libel a crime conflicted with the central meaning of the First Amendment ("Fighting Words"). In New York Times v. United States (1971) the Court prevented the federal government from exercising "prior restraint" to stop a newspaper from printing information about the Vietnam War that it wanted to withhold from the public. In Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969) it ruled that advocacy of violence or revolution may be prohibited only if it constitutes a "direct incitement to imminent lawless action that is likely to occur" and applied the 'Brandenburg test' to make similar pro-free speech decisions in Hess v Indiana (1973).


Conclusion

The Yates v the United States decision by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1957 in which it severely limited the application of the Smith Act to alleged acts of sedition, marked the end of the deplorable witch-hunt of the Communists and political dissenters in the post World War II era. It marked a reversal of the U.S. law to the spirit of the freedom and liberty that were hallmarks of the American struggle of Independence. It also set in motion, other Supreme Court decisions and a series of events leading to the success of the Civil Rights Movement in the sixties as well as the consolidation of the right of free speech and free press.

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