Question

The excerpt below was written by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes in the decision of Schenck v. United States (1919).

The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shounting fire in a theatre and causing a panic.... The question in everycase is whether the words used are used in such curcumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that congress has a right to prevent.

Which conduct did the U.S Supreme Court determine was a “clear and present danger” in this case?


demonstrations in which protestors burned American flags


newspaper articles criticizing U.S. entry into the war


the presence of Japanese Americans on the West Coast


the mailing of pamphlets advising young men to resist the draft

Answer 1

Answer: The mailing of pamphlets advising young men to resist the draft

Step-by-step explanation:

As much as every American is entitled to freedom of speech by the First Commandment, according to the case of Schenck v. United States (1919), that does not apply when the words spoken created a clear and present danger.

This is what the defendants in the case had done when they mailed pamphlets to young men urging them to resist a draft into the U.S. army even though the Americans were now at war with Germany in the first World War.