ABSTRACT
Anita Whitney, a social worker, was convicted by California of organizing, assisting in organizing, and being a member of the Communist Labor Party. Louis D. Brandeis in Whitney changed that to differentiate advocacy from incitement to imminent action, so that the only permissible limit was on speech that presented an immediate threat of extremely serious danger. The great breadth of the speech right articulated by Brandeis continues to differentiate US speech law from that of any other country in the world. The writers of the Constitution, Brandeis said, knew that speech could be dangerous, but they believed "in the power of reason as applied through public discussion." Justice Louis D. Brandeis wrote separately, indicating his disagreement with the Court's reasoning and fashioning what may be the most eloquent statement of the approach to free speech in the United States.
