Montana’s Fight for Free Speech: The Forgotten Law That Silenced a State in WWI

Spend more than five minutes in Montana and you’ll pick up on something really fast: we love our freedom and although we might not always agree with everything going on, we love our country.

Montana is known for being fiercely independent, deeply patriotic, and proud of our heritage. That’s why it’s so hard to believe that at one point in our state’s history, Montana made it illegal to speak out against the government. Sounds impossible, right? Unfortunately, it’s true, and the consequences were heartbreaking.

World War I and a Rising Tension

Around the time that the United States joined World War I, tensions in Montana were running high. Many Montanans were against entering the war in the first place. However, once America entered the war, things shifted fast. Criticizing the president or the war effort became not just frowned upon, but flat out dangerous.

When Words Became a Crime

In 1918, the Montana Legislature passed the Montana Sedition Law. Just saying something against the war, even in a private conversation, could land a person in jail and sadly, many were imprisoned.

The law was an aggressive extension of the federal Espionage Act, and it gave local authorities broad power to arrest people simply for speaking their minds. Conversations in bars, letters to family, even an offhanded remark could turn into a criminal charge.

Montana’s Crackdown on Its Own Citizens

Over the course of just two years, 76 men and 3 women were convicted of sedition. Of those, 40 men and one woman were sentenced to time in the state penitentiary in Deer Lodge. One man received up to 20 years for joking about wartime food regulations.

These weren’t violent criminals or dangerous revolutionaries. They were regular people: farmers, ranchers, clerks, and homemakers. They just had opinions and they paid dearly for them.

The Heartbreaking Story of Herman Bausch

Perhaps no story illustrates the injustice of the Montana Sedition Law more than Herman Bausch’s. A German immigrant who moved to America at 16, Herman worked hard to build a life in Montana. He became a citizen, learned English, and started a family near present day Billings.

But Then Came the War

Bausch’s roots were in Bavaria, and like many German-Americans at the time, he didn’t support the idea of the U.S. getting involved in World War I. Unfortunately, in Montana, that kind of thinking didn’t fly.

An Unexpected Visit

On April 13, 1918, a group of local men calling themselves a “third degree committee” marched onto Herman’s property. These types of groups were forming all over Montana, trying to sniff out anyone not fully on board with the war effort. Since Herman was doing well financially, they demanded he buy Liberty Bonds.

Herman refused. And he reportedly said something that didn’t go over well: “We should have never entered this war and this war should be stopped immediately and peace declared.”

→ Read the entire article on the MIX 97.1 website.
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