World War I critics get pardons

Could this happen again? Laws designed to enhance security after the 2001 attacks encroach on our security. If we cave in to fear and hysteria, liberty will suffer under the guise of security. People are already talking about setting up tent cities to house undocumented workers, who they demand be rounded up.

HELENA, Montana (AP) -- It was a black mark on dozens of family histories that lingered for nearly nine decades -- until a journalism professor and a group of law students examined what happened to citizens who spoke out against the government during World War I.

On Wednesday, nearly 80 people convicted of sedition amid the war's anti-German hysteria received the first posthumous pardons in Montana history, including one who was imprisoned merely for calling the conflict a "rich man's war" and mocking food regulations during a time of rationing.

Governor Brian Schweitzer said the state was "about 80 years too late" in pardoning the mostly working-class people of German descent who were convicted of breaking what was then one of the harshest sedition laws in the nation.

"This should have been done a long time ago," Schweitzer said.

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