Frohwerk v. United States

249 U.S. 204 (1919)

Decided a week after Schenck, this is the second in the series of unanimous opinions written by Holmes upholding convictions of leftists protesting WWI under the Espionage Act (Schenck, Frohwek, and Debs). This is just a squib case in Sullivan & Feldman and for good reason: the opinion adds no real doctrinal analysis to Schenck. Thus Holmes wrote, “[We] have decided in [Schenck] that a person may be convicted of conspiracy to obstruct recruiting by words of persuasion.”

Note that although Frohwerk was decided on March 10, 1919, I have changed its date to March 9 on the map. This is to distinguish it from Debs, which was actually decided on the same day and would therefore occupy the same spot on the map.

USEFUL LINKS

CourtListener (full opinion text)

Oyez (summary)

Wikipedia (more links)