{
  "title": "Search, stage: punish, 1900 to 1949",
  "canonical_url": "https://thewaronnews.com/search?stage=punish&from=1900&to=1949",
  "filters": {
    "stage": "punish",
    "from": "1900",
    "to": "1949"
  },
  "sort": "date",
  "count": 5,
  "page": 1,
  "pages": 1,
  "per_page": 50,
  "counts_caveat": "The number of entries reflects the depth of this record, not the severity of a country's conduct.",
  "facets": {
    "country": [
      {
        "value": "PH",
        "label": "Philippines",
        "rsf": {
          "index": "RSF World Press Freedom Index",
          "year": 2026,
          "rank": 114,
          "of": 180,
          "label": "RSF 2026 rank: 114th of 180",
          "source_url": "https://rsf.org/en/index"
        }
      },
      {
        "value": "US",
        "label": "United States",
        "rsf": {
          "index": "RSF World Press Freedom Index",
          "year": 2026,
          "rank": 64,
          "of": 180,
          "label": "RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180",
          "source_url": "https://rsf.org/en/index"
        }
      }
    ],
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        "label": "Asia"
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        "count": 3
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        "label": "Secrets and espionage laws",
        "count": 2
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      {
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        "count": 2
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        "label": "Expulsion and visa denial",
        "count": 1
      },
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        "value": "shutdowns_and_blocking",
        "label": "Shutdowns and blocking",
        "count": 1
      }
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        "value": "punish",
        "label": "Punish",
        "count": 5
      }
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        "value": "national",
        "label": "National",
        "count": 4
      },
      {
        "value": "state_or_province",
        "label": "State or province",
        "count": 1
      }
    ],
    "outcome": [
      {
        "value": "upheld",
        "label": "Upheld by a court",
        "count": 4
      },
      {
        "value": "reversed",
        "label": "Reversed",
        "count": 1
      }
    ],
    "leader": [
      {
        "value": "al-smith",
        "label": "Alfred E. Smith"
      },
      {
        "value": "theodore-roosevelt",
        "label": "Theodore Roosevelt"
      },
      {
        "value": "william-howard-taft",
        "label": "William Howard Taft"
      },
      {
        "value": "woodrow-wilson",
        "label": "Woodrow Wilson"
      }
    ],
    "era": [
      {
        "value": "1910s",
        "label": "1910s",
        "count": 2
      },
      {
        "value": "1900s",
        "label": "1900s",
        "count": 2
      },
      {
        "value": "1920s",
        "label": "1920s",
        "count": 1
      }
    ],
    "year": [
      {
        "value": "1901",
        "label": "1901",
        "count": 1
      },
      {
        "value": "1909",
        "label": "1909",
        "count": 1
      },
      {
        "value": "1917",
        "label": "1917",
        "count": 1
      },
      {
        "value": "1918",
        "label": "1918",
        "count": 1
      },
      {
        "value": "1925",
        "label": "1925",
        "count": 1
      }
    ],
    "has_case": [
      {
        "value": "0",
        "label": "without a court case",
        "count": 5
      }
    ]
  },
  "results": [
    {
      "slug": "1925-us-supreme-court-upholds-gitlow-anarchy-conviction",
      "title": "United States: Supreme Court upholds Benjamin Gitlow's conviction under New York's Criminal Anarchy Law, 1925",
      "occurred_on": "1925-06-08",
      "occurred_on_precision": "day",
      "country": "US",
      "country_name": "United States",
      "continent": "north-america",
      "jurisdiction": "US-NY",
      "level": "state_or_province",
      "tactic_primary": "secrets_and_espionage_laws",
      "tactics": [
        "detention_and_violence",
        "secrets_and_espionage_laws"
      ],
      "leader_slug": "al-smith",
      "leader_name": "Alfred E. Smith",
      "issue_of_the_day": "Fears of growing socialist and union activity during the Red Scare that followed the First World War led Congress and state legislatures, including New York's, to adopt new restrictions on radical speech and publishing.",
      "outcome": "upheld",
      "outcome_on": "1925-06-08",
      "outcome_note": "The Supreme Court's decision upheld Gitlow's conviction and New York's Criminal Anarchy Law while establishing that free speech and press protections apply to state governments through the Fourteenth Amendment.",
      "stage": "punish",
      "ladder_note": null,
      "rsf": {
        "index": "RSF World Press Freedom Index",
        "year": 2026,
        "rank": 64,
        "of": 180,
        "label": "RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180",
        "source_url": "https://rsf.org/en/index"
      },
      "era": "1920s",
      "granularity": "anchor",
      "status": "historical",
      "case_count": 0,
      "summary": "The United States Supreme Court voted seven to two on June 8, 1925 to uphold the conviction of socialist publisher Benjamin Gitlow, who had been tried and sentenced to prison under New York's 1902 Criminal Anarchy Law for distributing 16,000 copies of the Left Wing Manifesto. The Court also held for the first time that the Fourteenth Amendment's due process clause extends free speech and press protections to state governments.",
      "url": "https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/1925-us-supreme-court-upholds-gitlow-anarchy-conviction"
    },
    {
      "slug": "1918-us-espionage-act-conviction-of-editor-frohwerk",
      "title": "United States convicts newspaper editor Jacob Frohwerk under the Espionage Act, June 1918",
      "occurred_on": "1918-06-26",
      "occurred_on_precision": "day",
      "country": "US",
      "country_name": "United States",
      "continent": "north-america",
      "jurisdiction": "US",
      "level": "national",
      "tactic_primary": "secrets_and_espionage_laws",
      "tactics": [
        "detention_and_violence",
        "secrets_and_espionage_laws"
      ],
      "leader_slug": "woodrow-wilson",
      "leader_name": "Woodrow Wilson",
      "issue_of_the_day": "The United States had entered the First World War in April 1917 and introduced a national draft, and federal prosecutors brought Espionage Act cases against numerous newspapers and speakers who opposed the war effort.",
      "outcome": "upheld",
      "outcome_on": "1919-03-10",
      "outcome_note": "The Supreme Court's ruling left Frohwerk's conviction and ten year sentence in place.",
      "stage": "punish",
      "ladder_note": null,
      "rsf": {
        "index": "RSF World Press Freedom Index",
        "year": 2026,
        "rank": 64,
        "of": 180,
        "label": "RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180",
        "source_url": "https://rsf.org/en/index"
      },
      "era": "1910s",
      "granularity": "anchor",
      "status": "historical",
      "case_count": 0,
      "summary": "Jacob Frohwerk, an associate editor of the German language newspaper the Missouri Staats-Zeitung, was tried and convicted in June 1918 under the Espionage Act of 1917 for publishing articles opposing American participation in the First World War, and was sentenced to ten years in prison on each of twelve counts, to run concurrently. The Supreme Court of the United States upheld the conviction on March 10, 1919.",
      "url": "https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/1918-us-espionage-act-conviction-of-editor-frohwerk"
    },
    {
      "slug": "1917-us-mother-earth-editor-emma-goldman-convicted-magazine-barred-from-mail",
      "title": "United States convicts Mother Earth editor Emma Goldman of draft conspiracy and bars her magazine from the mail",
      "occurred_on": "1917-01-01",
      "occurred_on_precision": "year",
      "country": "US",
      "country_name": "United States",
      "continent": "north-america",
      "jurisdiction": "US",
      "level": "national",
      "tactic_primary": "detention_and_violence",
      "tactics": [
        "detention_and_violence",
        "expulsion_and_visa_denial",
        "shutdowns_and_blocking"
      ],
      "leader_slug": "woodrow-wilson",
      "leader_name": "Woodrow Wilson",
      "issue_of_the_day": "The United States had entered the First World War in April 1917 and introduced a national draft that spring, and federal authorities moved against anarchists, socialists and other war opponents under new wartime laws.",
      "outcome": "upheld",
      "outcome_on": "1918-01-14",
      "outcome_note": "Goldman's conviction stood, and she was deported from the United States in 1919.",
      "stage": "punish",
      "ladder_note": null,
      "rsf": {
        "index": "RSF World Press Freedom Index",
        "year": 2026,
        "rank": 64,
        "of": 180,
        "label": "RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180",
        "source_url": "https://rsf.org/en/index"
      },
      "era": "1910s",
      "granularity": "anchor",
      "status": "historical",
      "case_count": 0,
      "summary": "Emma Goldman, editor of the anarchist magazine Mother Earth, was convicted with fellow anarchist Alexander Berkman of conspiring against the newly enacted Selective Draft Law and received the maximum two year sentence and a ten thousand dollar fine. Postal authorities then withdrew Mother Earth's second class mailing privileges, and Goldman was deported from the United States in 1919.",
      "url": "https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/1917-us-mother-earth-editor-emma-goldman-convicted-magazine-barred-from-mail"
    },
    {
      "slug": "1909-us-panama-canal-libel-prosecutions",
      "title": "United States: President Theodore Roosevelt seeks criminal libel indictments against the New York World and the Indianapolis News over Panama Canal reporting",
      "occurred_on": "1909-03-04",
      "occurred_on_precision": "day",
      "country": "US",
      "country_name": "United States",
      "continent": "north-america",
      "jurisdiction": "US",
      "level": "national",
      "tactic_primary": "insult_and_defamation_laws",
      "tactics": [
        "insult_and_defamation_laws",
        "lawsuits_against_press"
      ],
      "leader_slug": "theodore-roosevelt",
      "leader_name": "Theodore Roosevelt",
      "issue_of_the_day": "The New York World and the Indianapolis News had published reports on who had profited from the United States' purchase of the Panama Canal, reports that Roosevelt disputed as libelous.",
      "outcome": "reversed",
      "outcome_on": "1911-01-03",
      "outcome_note": "The Supreme Court's 1911 ruling that no federal criminal libel law existed for offenses on federal enclaves left the World and the News without convictions and was later described as an early safeguard for the freedom of the press.",
      "stage": "punish",
      "ladder_note": null,
      "rsf": {
        "index": "RSF World Press Freedom Index",
        "year": 2026,
        "rank": 64,
        "of": 180,
        "label": "RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180",
        "source_url": "https://rsf.org/en/index"
      },
      "era": "1900s",
      "granularity": "anchor",
      "status": "historical",
      "case_count": 0,
      "summary": "President Theodore Roosevelt sought federal criminal libel indictments against the publishers of the New York World and the Indianapolis News after they reported that he and other officials had profited from the United States' purchase of the Panama Canal. Federal courts in New York and Indiana dismissed the indictments, and the Supreme Court upheld that result in 1911.",
      "url": "https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/1909-us-panama-canal-libel-prosecutions"
    },
    {
      "slug": "1901-philippines-us-colonial-libel-act-el-renacimiento",
      "title": "Philippines: United States colonial government's libel law is used to close the newspaper El Renacimiento",
      "occurred_on": "1901-01-01",
      "occurred_on_precision": "year",
      "country": "PH",
      "country_name": "Philippines",
      "continent": "asia",
      "jurisdiction": "PH",
      "level": "national",
      "tactic_primary": "insult_and_defamation_laws",
      "tactics": [
        "insult_and_defamation_laws",
        "lawsuits_against_press"
      ],
      "leader_slug": "william-howard-taft",
      "leader_name": "William Howard Taft",
      "issue_of_the_day": "El Renacimiento was a newspaper that supported Philippine independence during United States colonial rule, and its 1908 editorial criticizing unnamed colonial officials as birds of prey drew a libel suit from Secretary of the Interior Dean C. Worcester.",
      "outcome": "upheld",
      "outcome_on": "1914-01-01",
      "outcome_note": "Kalaw and Ocampo's convictions were affirmed on appeal, and Governor-General Francis Burton Harrison pardoned Ocampo in 1914, after the fine had already forced the paper to close.",
      "stage": "punish",
      "ladder_note": null,
      "rsf": {
        "index": "RSF World Press Freedom Index",
        "year": 2026,
        "rank": 114,
        "of": 180,
        "label": "RSF 2026 rank: 114th of 180",
        "source_url": "https://rsf.org/en/index"
      },
      "era": "1900s",
      "granularity": "anchor",
      "status": "historical",
      "case_count": 0,
      "summary": "The United States colonial government in the Philippines enacted a criminal libel law in 1901 that Governor-General William Howard Taft defended by saying Filipinos were unused to the freedom of the press. The law was used in 1908 to convict the editors and publisher of the pro-independence newspaper El Renacimiento over an editorial criticizing colonial officials, and the resulting fine forced the paper to close.",
      "url": "https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/1901-philippines-us-colonial-libel-act-el-renacimiento"
    }
  ],
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  "license": {
    "name": "CC BY 4.0",
    "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"
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}