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Sedition is a term of law to refer to covert conduct such as speech and organization that is deemed by the legal authority as tending toward insurrection against the established order. Sedition often included subversion of a constitution and incitement of discontent (or resistance) to lawful authority. Sedition may include any commotion, though not aimed at direct and open violence against the laws.
Because sedition is typically considered the subvert act, the overt acts that may be prosecutable under sedition laws vary from one legal code to another. Where those legal codes have a traceable history, there is also a record of the change of definition for what constituted sedition at certain points in history. This overview has served to develop a sociological definition of sedition as well, within study of persecution.
The difference between sedition and treason consists primarily in the subjective ultimate object of the violation to the public peace. Sedition does not consist of levying war against a government nor of adhering to its enemies, giving enemies aid, and giving enemies comfort. Nor does it consist, in most representative democracies, of peaceful protest against a government, nor of attempting to change the government by democratic means (such as direct democracy or constitutional convention).
History
Sedition in its modern meaning first appeared in the Elizabethan Era (c. 1590) as the "notion of inciting by words or writings disaffection towards the state or constitued authority" *. Ibid, p90: "Sedition complements treason and martial law: while treason controls primarily the privileged, ecclesiastical opponents, priests, and Jesuits, as well as certain commoners; and martial law frightens commoners, sedition frightens intellectuals."
An infamous Federal statute in U.S. history is the Alien and Sedition Acts.
Australia's sedition laws were amended in anti-terrorism legislation passed on 06 December 2005, updating definitions and increasing penalties.
Laura Berg, a nurse at a U.S. Dept. of Veterans Affairs hospital in New Mexico was investigated in September 2005 for sedition after writing a letter *to" target="_blank" >the editor of a local newspaper, criticizing the government. Ms. Berg is now being [http://aclu.org/freespeech/gen/24043prs20060131.html represented by the ACLU.
In New Zealand Tim Selwyn was convicted of sedition (section 83 of the Crimes Act 1961) on 8 June 2006. He is planning to appeal.
See also
Reference
- Breight, Curtis, C. Surveillance, militarism and drama in the Elizabethan Era, Macmillian 1996: London.
- A synopsis of the Australian sedition laws: http://www.law.gov.au/agd/Department/Publications/publications/ICCPR3/articles/article20.pdf
"Sedition"