Perilous Times: Free Speech in Wartime: From the Sedition Act of 1798 to the War on Terrorism by Geoffrey R. Stone

Synopsis

"A must-read for all who treasure the First Amendment."—Alan M. Dershowitz, Boston Globe

Geoffrey Stone's Perilous Times incisively investigates how the First Amendment and other civil liberties have been compromised in America during wartime. Stone delineates the consistent suppression of free speech in six historical periods from the Sedition Act of 1798 to the Vietnam War, and ends with a coda that examines the state of civil liberties in the Bush era. Full of fresh legal and historical insight, Perilous Times magisterially presents a dramatic cast of characters who influenced the course of history over a two-hundred-year period: from the presidents—Adams, Lincoln, Wilson, Roosevelt, and Nixon—to the Supreme Court justices—Taney, Holmes, Brandeis, Black, and Warren—to the resisters—Clement Vallandingham, Emma Goldman, Fred Korematsu, and David Dellinger. Filled with dozens of rare photographs, posters, and historical illustrations, Perilous Times is resonant in its call for a new approach in our response to grave crises.

Hailed as "the most important book of its kind since Zechariah Chafee Jr. first published his heralded Freedom of Speech in 1920," Perilous Times, in the words of Studs Terkel, is "must reading for every citizen interested in something called the First Amendment." Michiko Kakutani of the New York Times wrote that Perilous Times is "an important, indeed necessary book on freedom indispensable…to the discovery and spread of political truth," and Bob Woodward proclaimed Perilous Times to be "a lively, masterful history—and reminder—of theessential role of the First Amendment during the stresses of war." Perilous Times incisively investigates the First Amendment in wartime like no previous book and, according to Elena Kagan, the dean of Harvard Law School, "promises to redefine the national debate on civil liberties and free speech." Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize; A New York Times Notable Book, a Philadelphia Inquirer Top 10 Book, a Washington Post Book World Rave, a Los Angeles Times Best Book, and a Chicago Tribune Best Book of 2004. 63 illustrations.

Biography

Geoffrey R. Stone, the Harry Kalven, Jr., Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago Law School, was dean of the law school from 1987 to 1993. He lives in Chicago, Illinois.