POINTEDLY PERILOUS
On December 15, 1791, the first ten amendments to the Constitution were ratified, enumerating, among other rights, a guarantee that “Congress shall make no law… abridging freedom of speech.” From the start, few thought that that statement meant exactly what it said; it was assumed almost universally to mean that freedom of speech was sacrosanct except in special circumstances. In 1798, the members of Congress made clear they saw such limitations in the First Amendment by passing the Sedition Act. To lawmakers, the country’s naval quasi-war with France marked a special circumstance that allowed them to forbid statements that defamed government officials or which could incite hatred against them.
Though the federal government and individual states later moved to curtail
