Brandenburg v. Ohio, , was a landmark United States Supreme Court

Supreme Court of the United States

The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...

 case based on the First Amendment

First Amendment to the United States Constitution

The First Amendment to the United States Constitution is part of the Bill of Rights. The amendment prohibits the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion, abridging the freedom of speech, infringing on the freedom of the press, interfering...

 to the U.S. Constitution

United States Constitution

The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It is the framework for the organization of the United States government and for the relationship of the federal government with the states, citizens, and all people within the United States.The first three...

. It held that government cannot punish inflammatory speech unless it is directed to inciting and likely to incite imminent lawless action

Imminent lawless action

"Imminent lawless action" is a standard currently used, and that was established by the United States Supreme Court in Brandenburg v. Ohio , for defining the limits of freedom of speech. Brandenburg clarified what constituted a "clear and present danger", the standard established by Schenck v....

. In particular, it overruled Ohio's criminal syndicalism statute, because that statute broadly prohibited the mere advocacy

Advocacy

Advocacy is a political process by an individual or a large group which normally aims to influence public-policy and resource allocation decisions within political, economic, and social systems and institutions; it may be motivated from moral, ethical or faith principles or simply to protect an...

 of violence. In the process, four prior Supreme Court decisions were invalidated:

• Schenck v. United States
  Schenck v. United States
  Schenck v. United States, , was a United States Supreme Court decision that upheld the Espionage Act of 1917 and concluded that a defendant did not have a First Amendment right to express freedom of speech against the draft during World War I. Ultimately, the case established the "clear and present...
  
  ,
• Abrams v. United States
  Abrams v. United States
  Abrams v. United States, 250 U.S. 616 , was a 7-2 decision of the United States Supreme Court involving the 1918 Amendment to the Espionage Act of 1917, which made it a criminal offense to urge curtailment of production of the materials necessary to the war against Germany with intent to hinder the...
  
  ,
• Whitney v. California
  Whitney v. California
  Whitney v. California, 274 U.S. 357 , was a United States Supreme Court decision upholding the conviction of an individual who had engaged in speech that raised a threat to society.-Facts:...
  
  ,
• Dennis v. United States
  Dennis v. United States
  Dennis v. United States, , was a United States Supreme Court case involving Eugene Dennis, general secretary of the Communist Party USA, which found that Dennis did not have a right under the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States to exercise free speech, publication and assembly,...
  
  ,

Clarence Brandenburg, a Ku Klux Klan

Ku Klux Klan

Ku Klux Klan, often abbreviated KKK and informally known as the Klan, is the name of three distinct past and present far-right organizations in the United States, which have advocated extremist reactionary currents such as white supremacy, white nationalism, and anti-immigration, historically...

 leader in rural Ohio

Ohio

Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...

, contacted a reporter at a Cincinnati television station and invited him to come and cover a KKK rally in Hamilton County

Hamilton County, Ohio

As of 2000, there were 845,303 people, 346,790 households, and 212,582 families residing in the county. The population density was 2,075 people per square mile . There were 373,393 housing units at an average density of 917 per square mile...

 in the summer of 1964.