Source: https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/amendment-1/maintenance-of-national-security-and-the-first-amendment
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 10:28:24+00:00

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Preservation of the security of the Nation from its enemies, foreign and domestic, is the obligation of government and one of the foremost reasons for government to exist. Pursuit of this goal may lead government officials at times to trespass in areas protected by the guarantees of speech and press and may require the balancing away of rights that might be preserved inviolate at other times. The drawing of the line is committed, not exclusively but finally, to the Supreme Court. In this section, we consider a number of areas in which the necessity to draw lines has arisen.
Criminal punishment for the ad-vocacy of illegal or of merely unpopular goals and ideas did not originate in the United States with the post-World War II concern with Communism. Enactment of and prosecutions under the Sedition Act of 1798690 and prosecutions under the federal espionage laws691 and state sedition and criminal syndicalism laws692 in the 1920s and early 1930s have been alluded to earlier.693 But it was in the 1950s and the 1960s that the Supreme Court confronted First Amendment concepts fully in determining the degree to which government could proceed against persons and organizations that it believed were plotting and conspiring both to advocate the overthrow of government and to accomplish that goal.
Compelled Registration of Communist Party.
Punishment for Membership in an Organization That Engages in Proscribed Advocacy.
Disabilities Attaching to Membership in Proscribed Organizations.
Employment Restrictions and Loyalty Oaths.
Invalidated the same year was an oath requirement, addressed to membership in the Communist Party and other proscribed organizations, which the state courts had interpreted to disqualify from employment “solely on the basis of organizational membership.” Stressing that membership might be innocent, that one might be unaware of an organization’s aims, or that he might have severed a relationship upon learning of its aims, the Court struck the law down; one must be or have been a member with knowledge of illegal aims.735 But subsequent cases firmly reiterated the power of governmental agencies to inquire into the associational relationships of their employees for purposes of determining fitness and upheld dismissals for refusal to answer relevant questions.736 In Shelton v. Tucker,737 however, a five-to-four majority held that, although a state could inquire into the fitness and competence of its teachers, a requirement that every teacher annually list every organization to which he belonged or had belonged in the previous five years was invalid because it was too broad, bore no rational relationship to the state’s interests, and had a considerable potential for abuse.
More precisely drawn oaths survived vagueness attacks but fell before First Amendment objections in the next three cases. Elfbrandt v. Russell741 involved an oath that as supplemented would have been violated by one who “knowingly and willfully becomes or remains a member of the communist party . . . or any other organization having for its purposes the overthrow by force or violence of the government” with “knowledge of said unlawful purpose of said organization.” The law’s blanketing in of “knowing but guiltless” membership was invalid, wrote Justice Douglas for the Court, because one could be a knowing member but not subscribe to the illegal goals of the organization; moreover, it appeared that one must also have participated in the unlawful activities of the organization before public employment could be denied.742 Next, in Keyishian v. Board of Regents,743 the oath provisions sustained in Adler744 were declared unconstitutional. A number of provisions were voided as vague,745 but the Court held invalid a new provision making Communist Party membership prima facie evidence of disqualification for employment because the opportunity to rebut the presumption was too limited. It could be rebutted only by denying membership, denying knowledge of advocacy of illegal overthrow, or denying that the organization advocates illegal overthrow. But “legislation which sanctions membership unaccompanied by specific intent to further the unlawful goals of the organization or which is not active membership violates constitutional limitations.”746 Similarly, in Whitehill v. Elkins,747 an oath was voided because the Court thought it might include within its proscription innocent membership in an organization that advocated illegal overthrow of government.
More recent cases do not illuminate whether membership changes in the Court presage a change in view with regard to the loyalty-oath question. In Connell v. Higginbotham748 an oath provision reading “that I do not believe in the overthrow of the Government of the United States or of the State of Florida by force or violence” was invalidated because the statute provided for summary dismissal of an employee refusing to take the oath, with no opportunity to explain that refusal. Cole v. Richardson749 upheld a clause in an oath “that I will oppose the overthrow of the government of the United States of America or of this Commonwealth by force, violence, or by any illegal or unconstitutional method” upon the construction that this clause was mere “repetition, whether for emphasis or cadence,” of the first part of the oath, which was a valid “uphold and defend” positive oath.
Legislative Investigations and the First Amendment.
The power of inquiry by congressional and state legislative committees in order to develop information as a basis for legislation750 is subject to some uncertain limitation when the power as exercised results in deterrence or penalization of protected beliefs, associations, and conduct. Although the Court initially indicated that it would scrutinize closely such inquiries in order to curb First Amendment infringement,751 later cases balanced the interests of the legislative bodies in inquiring about both protected and unprotected associations and conduct against what were perceived to be limited restraints upon the speech and association rights of witnesses, and upheld wide-ranging committee investigations.752 Later, the Court placed the balance somewhat differently and required that the investigating agency show “a subordinating interest which is compelling” to justify the restraint on First Amendment rights that the Court found would result from the inquiry.753 The issues in this field, thus, remain unsettled.
Interference With Vietnam War Effort.
Suppression of Communist Propaganda in the Mails.
Exclusion of Certain Aliens as a First Amendment Problem.

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