Meese v. Keene

The Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938 (the act) was enacted to protect the security and foreign relations of the United States by requiring individuals to disclose any political propaganda that the individual wanted to distribute in the country. The act was created in response to investigations by the House Un-American Activities Committee into Nazi propaganda. Public disclosure was meant to protect the public by giving the public the opportunity to evaluate the background of the material. Political propaganda was defined in the act as being any oral, visual, or written communication that was intended to indoctrinate, convert, or influence a person in the United States with the political or public interests of a foreign government. Barry Keene (plaintiff), a member of the California State Senate, wanted to show three films about nuclear war and acid rain that were produced in Canada. To satisfy the act, Keene would have been required to send the films with a description of their contents to Edwin Meese, the United States attorney general (defendant). Keene would also have to provide any viewers of the films with a letter explaining that the films were registered with the attorney general under the act and that the contents of the films were not necessarily approved by the United States government. The act did not, however, require that the letter explicitly label the material as political propaganda. Keene challenged the act in district court, alleging that his reputation would suffer if he were required to exhibit the films under the requirements of the act. The district court held that the act violated the First Amendment by regulating content deemed to be political propaganda and thereby restricting freedom of speech. The district court reasoned that labeling material as political propaganda would place the material outside acceptable public discourse. The government appealed.