Which test is associated with Schenck v. United States as the standard for limiting speech during wartime?

• A. Clear and present danger test
• B. Fighting words test
• C. Bad tendency test
• D. Mere incitement test

Answer: (A)

The idea being tested is the clear and present danger standard. In wartime, the Supreme Court held that speech can be restricted if it creates a real and immediate danger that the government has the power to prevent. In Schenck v. United States, a man distributed anti-draft materials during World War I, and the Court upheld his conviction because the speech posed a clear and present danger to the war effort and to enforcement of the draft. The test asks not whether the speech is merely offensive or unpopular, but whether it would likely bring about substantial evil that the government has a right to prevent, given the circumstances of war.

The other tests don’t fit this specific wartime context. The fighting words doctrine targets speech that directly incites violence in a face-to-face setting. The bad tendency test looks at whether speech has a tendency to incite wrongdoing in a broad sense, without the wartime immediacy angle. The mere incitement standard, developed later, requires imminent lawless action and is not the standard Schenck established for wartime speech.