Posted on 12/28/2005 8:45:32 AM PST by Chi-townChief
On April 23, 1918, with the U.S. in the depths of World War I, Fred Rodewald, a German immigrant homesteader who had settled with his family on 320 acres in eastern Montana, uttered a sentence that forever changed his life.
He suggested that Americans "would have hard times" if Germany's kaiser "didn't get over here and rule this country."
That remark earned him 2 years in prison for violating Montana's Sedition Act. When he went off to the penitentiary in Deer Lodge, the 42-year-old Rodewald left behind a pregnant wife and eight children. An armistice ended the war less than a month later.
Now, nearly 90 years later, law students at the University of Montana have begun a quest and are prowling dusty archives and musty courthouse storage rooms across the state to clear Rodewald and 73 other Montanans convicted of sedition.
The project provides a contrast between the waning days of World War I, when a farmer could be jailed for suggesting that it was "a rich man's war," and today, when citizens can criticize the war in Iraq without fear of prosecution, if not without fear of government surveillance.
Sparked by "Darkest Before Dawn: Sedition and Free Speech in the American West," a new book by Clemens Work, a University of Montana journalism professor, seven law students have begun reinvestigating the cases to prepare clemency petitions that they intend to present to Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer this spring.
When first notified of the possibility of a pardon, Rodewald's granddaughter Phyllis Rolf, of Minnesota, wept.
"I will be very, very happy if they can clear not only my grandfather, but all of them," Rolf said.
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
Why pardon them?
Perhaps if a few of those DU or Hollywood fools were given time to reflect on their message in prison, they might learn the difference between loyal opposition and sedition.
Will it change anything by pardoning them?
Welcome to FR
Can't we use this on the NY times editors?
HOWEVER treason in a time of war is defined in the Constitution.
You cannot provide "aid and comfort" to the enemy. A number of outspoken "critics" have done this when they have carried banners that read "I support our troops when they shoot their officers" and written things like:
The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not "insurgents" or "terrorists" or "The Enemy." They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win. Get it, Mr. Bush?....I oppose the U.N. or anyone else risking the lives of their citizens to extract us from our debacle...the majority of Americans supported this war once it began and, sadly, that majority must now sacrifice their children until enough blood has been let that maybe -- just maybe -- God and the Iraqi people will forgive us in the end. (Michael Moore for his blog)
and
The long-dreaded 2004 Olympics in Greece will be the ultimate crossroads for sports and politics in this new and vicious century. The recent photos of cruelty at the Abu Grahaib all-american prison in Baghdad have taken care of that.Yes, sir. We have taken the bull by the horns on this one, sports fans. These horrifying digital snapshots of the American dream in action on foreign soil are worse than anything even I could have expected. I have been in this business a long time and I have seen many staggering things, but this one is over the line. Now I am really ashamed to carry an American passport. Not even the foulest atrocities of Adolf Hitler ever shocked me so badly as these photographs did. (Hunter S. Thompson for Disney owned ESPN)
American born Mildred Gillars (aka Axis Sally) was convicted of treason after WWII and sentenced to prison.
American born William Joyce (aka Lord Haw Haw) was convicted of treason after WWII and hanged.
Used to know how to treat the media who supported nazism.
Hunter got his by his own hand no less; hopefully, Moore will come to the same realization.
More un-American than government officials doing everything they can to endanger their constituents with real acts of traitorism and treason?
Wife's grandfather was a Arkansas farmer of German linage, in WW 1 he too got into trouble. He said the Kaiser should come over and run the country it was so messed up. He was tried in AR court and was sentenced, could only have freedom of movement from 6 AM until 6 PM, but was under house arrest at night.
I didn't read the book you refer to, but if the people jailed were immigrants--it would make sense. (Although, ten years plus does sound extreme.) I wonder if today's immigrants sign such a paper denouncing the country that they come from.
...when citizens can criticize the war in Iraq without fear of prosecution, if not without fear of government surveillance.
A "time of war" is defined in the Constitution as well.
And who was President back then? Hmmm the Rat's hero, Woodrow Wilson.
Name ONE citizen imprisoned for demanding explanations?
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