Sec. 4. When the United States is at war, the Postmaster General may, upon evidence satisfactory to him that any person or concern is using the mails in violation of any of the provisions of this Act, instruct the postmaster at any post office at which mail is received addressed to such person or concern to return to the postmaster at the office at which they were originally mailed all letters or other matter so addressed, with the words "Mail to this address undeliverable under Espionage Act" plainly written or stamped upon the outside thereof and all such letters or other matter so returned to such postmasters shall be by them returned to the senders thereof under such regulations as the Postmaster General may prescribe.
An All-Embracing Clause
Read over the ninth clause of section 3 again: "whoever shall by word or act support or favor the cause of any country with which the United States is at war, or by word or act oppose the cause of the United States therein—." That clause alone serves to make enemy propaganda or native-born sedition a hazardous undertaking in any community where League members are awake and on the job.
Gone is the necessity of arguing and pleading with the pro-German, the pacifist and the native-born disloyalist to speak with straight tongues. Loyal citizens retain the right to free speech and to honest and reasonable criticism of the Government's actions and policies. But indiscriminate abuse and lying reports of what is happening here at home or overseas are going to stop. The amended law is a powerful weapon put into our hands for that very purpose.
Notice also that the word "willfully" is omitted in Clause Nine. To convict a man of disloyalty or sedition, you will not have to prove his disloyal or hostile intention. Like murder or burglary, espionage and sedition are become positive crimes. No one who commits them can plead innocent intent.
