The US today freely interferes in the governments of so many other nations, fueling unrest and financing violence, seeking to impose on these countries a peculiarly American form of “open government” which it can control, but has always severely restricted any such activity either suspected or real, on its own soil. We have already read about the Un-American Activities Act [1] and the extensive government policies to prohibit political activism or promote other forms of government or capitalism in those years, and I briefly mentioned the Sedition Act passed by President Woodrow Wilson‘s government in the early 1900s. [2]
This latter legislation was directed against all Americans and used to firmly silence criticism of government policies. Under this Act, the government engaged in countless illegal searches and seizures of property and imprisoned tens of thousands of US citizens simply for criticising Wilson’s desire for war. The authorities organised gangs to regularly intimidate and beat up citizens, unrelated to the propaganda war on the Germans. Wilson admitted openly that many of his laws and activities were unconstitutional, but often protected himself with claims of national security.