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enforcing such duty. "The same act," it was said, “may be an offense or transgression of the laws of both" Nation and State, and both may punish it without a conflict of their sovereignties. Numerous cases were cited commencing with Moore v. Illinois, 14 How. 13, and terminating with Halter v. Nebraska, 205 U. S. 34.1

The latter case is especially pertinent in its sentiment and reasoning. It sustained a statute of Nebraska directed against the debasement of the National flag to trade uses against the contention that the flag being the National emblem was subject only to the control of the National power. In sustaining the statute it was recognized that in a degradation of the flag there is a degradation of all of which it is the symbol, that is, "the National power and National honor" and what they represent and have in trust. To maintain and reverence these, to "encourage patriotism and love of country among its people," may be affirmed, it was said, to be a duty that rests upon each State, and that "when, by its legislation, the State encourages a feeling of patriotism towards the Nation, it necessarily encourages a like feeling towards the State."

And so with the statute of Minnesota. An army is an instrument of government, a necessity of its power and honor, and it may be, of its security. An army, of course, can only be raised and directed by Congress, in neither has

1 In Gustafson v. Rhinow, 144 Minnesota, 415, the Supreme Court of Minnesota sustained a law of the State giving to soldiers who served in the war against Germany $15 for each month or fraction of a month of service, against an attack that the soldiers were soldiers of the United States. The court expressed the concern and interest of the State as follows: "It is true that the Federal government alone has power to declare war, but having done so, the government and people of Minnesota became bound to defend and support the national government. While the states of the nation are sovereign in a certain field, they are also members of the family of states constituting the national organization."

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the State power, but it has power to regulate the conduct of its citizens and to restrain the exertion of baleful influences against the promptings of patriotic duty to the detriment of the welfare of the Nation and State. To do so is not to usurp a National power, it is only to render a service to its people, as Nebraska rendered a service to its people when it inhibited the debasement of the flag.

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We concur, therefore, in the final conclusion of the court, that the State is not inhibited from making "the national purposes its own purposes to the extent of exerting its police power to prevent its own citizens from obstructing the accomplishment of such purposes."

The statute, indeed, may be supported as a simple exertion of the police power to preserve the peace of the State. As counsel for the State say, "The act under consideration does not relate to the raising of armies for the national defense, nor to rules and regulations for the government of those under arms. It is simply a local police measure, aimed to suppress a species of seditious speech which the legislature of the State has found objectionable. If the legislature has otherwise power to prohibit utterances of the character of those here complained of, the fact that such suppression has some contributory effect on the federal function of raising armies is quite beside the question." And the State knew the conditions which existed and could have a solicitude for the public peace, and this record justifies it. Gilbert's remarks were made in a public meeting. They were resented by his auditors. There were protesting interruptions, also accusations and threats against him, disorder and intimations of violence. And such is not an uncommon experience. On such occasions feeling usually runs high and is impetuous; there is a prompting to violence and when violence is once yielded to, before it can be quelled, tragedies may be enacted. To preclude such result or a

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danger of it is a proper exercise of the power of the State. Presser v. Illinois, 116 U. S. 252, 267.

The next contention is, that the statute is violative of the right of free speech, and therefore void. It is asserted that the right of free speech is a natural and inherent right, and that it, and the freedom of the press, were "regarded as among the most sacred and vital possessed by mankind, when this nation was born, when its constitution was framed and adopted." And the contention seems necessary for the plaintiff in error to support. But without so deciding or considering the freedom asserted as guaranteed or secured either by the Constitution of the United States or by the constitution of the State, we pass immediately to the contention and for the purposes of this case may concede it, that is, concede that the asserted freedom is natural and inherent, but it is not absolute, it is subject to restriction and limitation. And this we have decided. In Schenck v. United States, 249 U. S. 47, 52, we distinguished times and occasions and said that "the most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic"; and in Frohwerk v. United States, 249 U. S. 204, 206, we said "that the First Amendment while prohibiting legislation against free speech as such cannot have been, and obviously was not, intended to give immunity for every possible use of language." See also, Debs v. United States, 249 U. S. 211; Abrams v. United States, 250 U. S. 616. In Schaefer v. United States, 251 U. S. 466, commenting on those cases and their contentions it was said that the curious spectacle was presented of the Constitution of the United States being invoked to justify the activities of anarchy or of the enemies of the United States, and by a strange perversion of its precepts it was adduced against itself. And we did more than reject the contention, we forestalled all repetitions of it, and the contention in the case at bar is a repetition of it. It is a direct assault upon

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the statute of Minnesota, and a direct assertion in spite of the prohibition of the statute that one can by speech, teach or advocate that the citizens of the State should not aid or assist "the United States in prosecuting or carrying on war with the public enemies of the United States," and be protected by the Constitution of the United States.

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The same conditions existed as in the cited cases, that is, a condition of war and its emergency existed, and there was explicit limitation to § 3 in the charge of the trial court to the jury. The court read §§ 2 and 3 of the statute to the jury and said, "I take it from the reading of the whole indictment that it is prosecuted under Section 3, which I have just read to you."

Gilbert's speech had the purpose they denounce. The Nation was at war with Germany, armies were recruiting, and the speech was the discouragement of that-its purpose was necessarily the discouragement of that. It was not an advocacy of policies or a censure of actions that a citizen had the right to make. The war was flagrant; it had been declared by the power constituted by the Constitution to declare it, and in the manner provided for by the Constitution. It was not declared in aggression, but in defense, in defense of our national honor, in vindication of the "most sacred rights of our Nation and our people."1

This was known to Gilbert for he was informed in affairs and the operations of the Government, and every word that he uttered in denunciation of the war was false, was deliberate misrepresentation of the motives which impelled it, and the objects for which it was prosecuted. He could have had no purpose other than that of which he was charged. It would be a travesty on the constitutional privilege he invokes to assign him its protection.

Judgment affirmed. 1Words of President Wilson in his War Message to Congress, April 2,

BRANDEIS, J., dissenting.

MR. JUSTICE HOLMES Concurs in the result.

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THE CHIEF JUSTICE, being of the opinion that the subject-matter is within the exclusive legislative power of Congress, when exerted, and that the action of Congress has occupied the whole field, therefore dissents.

MR. JUSTICE BRANDEIS, dissenting.

Joseph Gilbert, manager of the organization department of the Non-partisan League, was sentenced to fine and imprisonment for speaking on August 18, 1917, at a public meeting of the League, words held to be prohibited by c. 463 of the laws of Minnesota, approved April 20, 1917. Gilbert was a citizen of the United States, and apparently of a State other than Minnesota. He claimed seasonably that the statute violated rights guaranteed to him by the Federal Constitution. This claim has been denied; and, in my opinion, erroneously.

The Minnesota statute was enacted during the World War; but it is not a war measure. The statute is said to have been enacted by the State under its police power to preserve the peace;-but it is in fact an act to prevent teaching that the abolition of war is possible. Unlike the Federal Espionage Act of June 15, 1917, c. 30, 40 Stat. 217, 219, it applies equally whether the United States is at peace or at war. It abridges freedom of speech and of the press, not in a particular emergency, in order to avert a clear and present danger, but under all circumstances. The restriction imposed relates to the teaching of the doctrine of pacifism and the legislature in effect proscribes it for all time. The statute does not in terms prohibit the teaching of the doctrine. Its prohibition is more specific and is directed against the teaching of certain applications of it. This specification operates, as will be seen, rather to extend, than to limit the scope of the prohibition.