This is the cover of a booklet titled “Free Speech and the Constitution in the War by C. E. S. Wood.” It notes that it is “Substantially a reprint of the argument against the constitutionality of the Espionage Act, from the brief filed in the Marie Equi case, no. 3328, U. S. Circuit Court of Appeals, ninth Circuit.” At the bottom there is a quote by Wendell Phillips, “The community that will not allow the humblest citizen to freely express his opinion, no matter how false it may be, is only a gang of slaves.” There is no date of publication on the booklet, but a handwritten note from the Labadie Collection has the date 1931 Dec. 3, the date it was donated to the library.
Marie Equi was a physician and political activist, including advocating for such causes as birth control, labor rights, and anti-war efforts. She was arrested and prosecuted for sedition for protesting against U.S. involvement in World War I, shortly after the passage of the Espionage Act of 1917 and the Sedition Act of 1918. Equi was imprisoned for one year and one day at the San Quentin State Prison in 1920-21. Leading up to her arrest, Equi protested WWI at a pre-war preparedness campaign parade with a banner that read “PREPARE to die, workingman — jp morgan & co. want preparedness for profit — thou shall not kill.”
