Ep. 230: Wilson vs. FDR: Who was worse for free speech?

Woodrow Wilson or Franklin D. Roosevelt: which president was
worse for free speech?


In August, FIRE posted a viral X thread, arguing that Woodrow
Wilson may be America’s worst-ever president for free speech.
Despite the growing recognition of Wilson’s censorship, there was
a professor who wrote a recent book on FDR’s free speech record,
arguing that FDR was worse. 


Representing the Wilson side in our discussion is Christopher
Cox, author of the new book, “Woodrow Wilson: The Light
Withdrawn.” Cox is a former member of the House of
Representatives, where he served for 17 years, including as chair
of the Homeland Security Committee. He is currently a senior
scholar in residence at the University of California,
Irvine. 


Representing the FDR side is professor David T. Beito, a Research
Fellow at the Independent Institute and Professor Emeritus at the
University of Alabama. He is the author of a number of books, his
latest being “The New Deal’s War on the Bill of Rights: The
Untold Story of FDR's Concentration Camps, Censorship, and Mass
Surveillance.”


Read the transcript.


Timestamps: 


00:00 Intro


03:41 Wilson’s free speech record


15:13 Was FDR’s record worse than Wilson’s?


24:01 Japanese internment


29:35 Wilson at the end of his presidency


37:42 FDR and Hugo Black


42:31 The Smith Act


45:42 Did Wilson regret his actions?


50:31 The suffragists


56:19 Did FDR regret his actions?


01:02:04 Outro


Show notes:




Espionage Act of 1917




Sedition Act of 1918




Executive Order (creating the Committee on Public
Information)




Schenk v. United States (1919)




Abrams v. United States (1919)




Smith Act of 1940




President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s “Four Freedoms” speech
(1941)




The Lend-Lease Program (1941-1945)