In the Republic’s earliest days, it was a printing press, not a gun, that fired the first shots at tyranny.
In 1735, a printer named John Peter Zenger sat in a New York jail cell for nearly nine months.
His crime?
Daring to publish unflattering truths about a colonial governor. At trial, his attorney stood before the jury and asked a revolutionary question: “Can it be libel if it’s true?”
The jury agreed it could not, and Zenger walked free. In that cramped, candle-lit courtroom, the seeds of American press freedom took root.
Fast forward nearly 300 years, and you’d think reporters today were preparing for a return to the dungeon.
CNN commentators sit in makeup chairs, trembling over revoked press badges.
Editorial pages paint Donald Trump as the second coming of Stalin.
The threat, they cry, is imminent. Arrests! Censorship! Fascism!
It’s theater. Bad theater.
And worse history.
History’s Real Press Repressions
John Adams and the Alien and Sedition Acts (1798)
In the fragile days of the early Republic, with war against France looming and partisan battles between Federalists and Jeffersonian Republicans reaching a fever pitch, President John Adams signed into law one of the most egregious assaults on free speech in American history: the Alien and Sedition Acts.
The Sedition Act made it a federal crime to publish “false, scandalous, and malicious” writing against the government.
And it wasn’t an idle threat.
Adams’ administration weaponized it against political enemies, targeting over 17 Republican editors and publishers. Among them:
- James Callender, who had previously exposed Alexander Hamilton’s affair and later criticized Adams as a “repulsive pedant.” For that, he was sentenced to nine months in jail.
- Matthew Lyon, a congressman and publisher in Vermont, was fined and jailed for criticizing Adams’ “unbounded thirst for ridiculous pomp.”
Meanwhile, Europe was in upheaval. France had just executed its king. Napoleon Bonaparte was rising fast.
Americans feared internal revolt, foreign invasion, and civil collapse. That panic gave Adams cover to silence dissent, but at a cost. The backlash helped sweep Thomas Jefferson into power in 1800, who promptly pardoned all those convicted under the act.
The lesson? Fear is the easiest excuse for tyranny, and the press is often its first victim.
Abraham Lincoln and Wartime Suppression (1861–1865)
Abraham Lincoln, the great emancipator, also had a darker record for press freedom, especially during the Civil War.
With the Union teetering and Confederate sympathizers active in border states, Lincoln suspended habeas corpus and authorized military arrests without trial.
This extended to newspaper editors deemed disloyal or obstructive.
- The Chicago Times, a pro-Southern Democratic paper, was shut down by military order in 1863 for publishing what the government called “treasonous language.” It was only reopened after public outcry.
- In Missouri, St. Louis Evening News editor Frank Key Howard was arrested and jailed in Fort McHenry for months, without charges, for criticizing the suspension of civil liberties.
- Over 300 newspapers, mainly in the North and Midwest, were either shut down, raided, or threatened with closure during the war.
Lincoln believed these measures were necessary to preserve the Union. He wasn’t trying to silence critics forever, but he was absolutely willing to muzzle them in wartime.
The country, meanwhile, was bleeding from Antietam to Gettysburg. The Constitution itself was hanging by a thread. Still, even Lincoln’s defenders admit his actions bent civil liberties to the breaking point.
Woodrow Wilson and the Espionage/Sedition Acts (1917–1918)
If Adams and Lincoln tested the limits, Woodrow Wilson smashed them.
America entered World War I in 1917, and Wilson moved quickly to crush dissent with the Espionage Act (1917) and the Sedition Act (1918).
Together, these laws criminalized speaking against the war effort, criticizing the government, or even opposing military conscription.
- Eugene V. Debs, a five-time presidential candidate and editor of Appeal to Reason, gave a speech opposing the draft. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Wilson refused to pardon him; Warren Harding did years later.
- Victor Berger, a Socialist newspaper editor in Milwaukee and the first Socialist elected to Congress, was tried under the Espionage Act. Though elected, Congress refused to seat him. His paper, The Milwaukee Leader, had its mailing rights revoked by the postmaster general.
- Over 2,000 people were prosecuted, and roughly 900 were jailed for anti-war speech.
This wasn't a few revoked credentials. It was a mass prosecution of American citizens, many immigrants, merely for having opinions. While young men were shipped off to die in the trenches of France, free speech was dying at home.
The Supreme Court disgracefully upheld many of these prosecutions. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes later reversed himself in Abrams v. U.S., planting the seeds for modern First Amendment protections.
But at the time, Wilson’s actions went virtually unchecked.
FDR and the World War II Censorship Machine (1940s)
While not jailing journalists, Franklin Roosevelt created a vast censorship regime during World War II. The Office of Censorship, formed in 1941, tightly controlled news of troop movements, ship sinkings, and even weather forecasts that could aid enemy forces.
The press mostly complied voluntarily. Editors knew the stakes. But a few who questioned or leaked sensitive material were investigated by the FBI or had their outlets blackballed from press briefings.
While not as overtly repressive, this was a powerful reminder: in wartime, even the free press often becomes a tool of national unity, sometimes at the expense of truth.
The Red Scare and McCarthy Era (1940s–1950s)
During the Cold War, a new form of suppression emerged: blacklisting.
Journalists, authors, screenwriters, and editors suspected of Communist ties or merely left-wing sympathies were hauled before House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) hearings, smeared in public, and professionally destroyed.
- Reporters such as I.F. Stone, despite a loyal readership, were ostracized and surveilled.
- Media outlets such as The Daily Worker were surveilled and harassed by federal agents.
No jail time for most, but lives and careers were ruined. The press lived in fear of being labeled “un-American,” a term tossed around as recklessly as “semi-fascist” is today.
Trump’s “Assault” on the Press: A Refresher
Now, compare that to Donald Trump. From 2015 through today, the worst accusations against him boil down to:
- Criticizing the press (often loudly);
- Revoking a CNN reporter’s press badge;
- Denying certain outlets access to specific events;
- Calling out media bias at rallies;
- Proposing to end federal funding to NPR and PBS;
- Questioning journalists who refuse to reveal sources.
These are not crimes against the First Amendment. They’re sparring matches. And most of them have occurred under the bright lights of a free press that keeps publishing whatever it pleases, often in direct opposition to him.
When Trump dared to suggest that reporters should be compelled to reveal their sources, legacy media gasped. And yet no journalist went to jail. When he called CNN “fake news,” editors panicked. Yet CNN expanded its international offices.
When the Associated Press was barred from a single briefing for refusing to say “Gulf of America,” a federal judge ruled against the White House.
The media won.
Again.
Selective Memory: Schiff, Suppression, and Political Drama
The narrative of political retribution has been a recurring theme in American politics, often surfacing during periods of heightened partisan tension.
In recent years, several Democratic lawmakers have complained about potential punitive actions under a renewed Trump administration.
Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) has been a central figure in this discourse. As the lead prosecutor in Trump's first impeachment trial and a prominent member of the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Schiff has frequently been at odds with Trump.
In interviews, Schiff has acknowledged the personal risks associated with his role, stating that he and his family have contemplated the implications of potential political retaliation.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) has also expressed concerns about possible retribution. In a 2024 interview, she remarked, "I mean, it sounds nuts, but I wouldn't be surprised if this guy threw me in jail," referencing Trump's past rhetoric and actions.
Ocasio-Cortez emphasized her belief that Trump's previous term was a precursor to more aggressive measures, highlighting his "lock her up" chants during the 2016 campaign as indicative of his approach to political opponents.
Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), representing Oakland, has been a vocal critic of Trump's immigration policies. In 2018, she accused the Trump administration of "criminalizing" illegal immigrants, highlighting concerns about the treatment of marginalized communities under his policies.
These expressions of concern are not isolated incidents, but part of a broader pattern in which political figures expect potential retribution based on past confrontations.
While the fears articulated by these lawmakers are rooted in their experiences and interpretations of Trump's rhetoric and actions, it's essential to differentiate between political discourse and actual policy implementation.
Historically, the United States has grappled with the balance between political opposition and governmental authority.
The concerns raised by Schiff, Ocasio-Cortez, and Lee underscore the importance of safeguarding democratic principles and ensuring that political disagreements do not escalate into punitive actions.
Did Trump Jail People Unfairly? Did He Defy Courts? Let’s Talk Facts
In eight years of political warfare, how many journalists has Donald Trump jailed? Zero.
How many editors? Zero.
How many court orders has he blatantly defied? Few.
Despite media hysteria, Trump has generally abided by judicial rulings, often reluctantly, but consistently. He issued executive orders that were swiftly challenged in courts (e.g., the original travel ban), but his administration revised them to meet legal standards.
That’s not dictatorship.
That’s democracy in action.
A Media That Cries Wolf While Wearing the Wolf's Clothing
Here lies the central irony: those who claim Trump will jail dissenters are often the ones eager to cancel, demonetize, deplatform, and destroy anyone who disagrees with them.
If speech is violence, as the woke lexicon suggests, then the media has become the most violent institution of all.
They blacklist speakers from campuses.
They campaign to ban books they dislike.
They pressure advertisers to abandon entire platforms for daring to host the "wrong" views.
Trump’s flaws are many, but when the press cries “dictator!” while wielding the tools of suppression themselves, it stops being journalism and becomes a projection.
The Boy Who Cried Tyrant
Americans aren’t fools.
They remember when actual press suppression meant real arrests, not revoked press credentials.
They know the difference between a strongman and a strong opinion.
The media might want to read some Zenger.
Or study Adams.
Or revisit Wilson.
Because compared to history’s actual repression of the press, Donald Trump is a heckler with a megaphone, not a jailer with keys.
And the louder the media wails, the more they remind the rest of us that the First Amendment still works just fine.
