Explain how the Alien and Sedition Act violated the 1st Amendment.

The Republican minority in Congress argued that sedition laws violated the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which protects freedom of speech and the press. The Federalists countered by defining these freedoms in the narrow English manner. According to English law, free speech and press only applied before the expression of ideas. The government could not censor or stop someone from expressing ideas. But after the words had been spoken or printed, the government could punish people if they had maliciously defamed the king or his government.

The Federalist majority in Congress passed the Sedition Act and President Adams signed it into law on July 14, 1798. It was set to expire on March 3, 1801, the last day of the first and—as it turned out—only presidential term of John Adams.

in his book, the riddle of the rosetta stone, james giblin talks about how there was a young british polymath and physician named thomas young who made a lot of advances on the deciphering of the rosetta stone. he says that even though young made a lot of mistakes because he was working under false assumptions, he also made huge contributions like deciphering three out of the seven symbols (more than anyone else before him). young published his findings and continued his good work but he wasn't able to progress much further due to some unfavorable situations, he still laid the basis for many other scholars and of course for the man who has been generally known to have deciphered it, jean-françois champollion