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''''Seditious conspiracy''' is a [[conspiracy]] to commit [[sedition]]. It is a [[federal crime in the United States]] per {{usc|18|2384}}: {{quote|If two or more persons in any State or Territory, or in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, conspire to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them, or to oppose by force the authority thereof, or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States, or by force to seize, take, or possess any property of the United States contrary to the authority thereof, they shall each be fined or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.}} For a seditious conspiracy charge to be effected, a crime need only be planned, it need not be actually attempted. According to Andres Torres and Jose E. Velazquez, the accusation of seditious conspiracy is of political nature and was used almost exclusively against [[Puerto Rican people|Puerto Rican]] [[independentistas]] in the twentieth century.<ref>Andrés Torres and Jose E. Velazquez. [https://books.google.com/books?id=XKJtYNvKKrgC&pg=PA238 ''The Puerto Rican movement: voices from the diaspora.''] Temple University Press. 1998. p. 238. Retrieved 2 June 2013.</ref> However, the act was also used in the twentieth century against communists ([[United Freedom Front]]),<ref name="nyt">{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/01/12/us/after-9-months-of-delays-us-tries-3-for-sedition.html|title=After 9 Months of Delays, U.S. Tries 3 for Sedition|agency=AP|date=1989-01-12|work=The New York Times|accessdate=2009-10-28}}</ref> [[neo-Nazis]],<ref>[http://www.adl.org/learn/ext_us/beam.asp "Louis Beam" at Anti-Defamation League (ADL) website.] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111219220144/http://www.adl.org/learn/ext_us/beam.asp |date=2011-12-19 }}</ref> and terrorists such as the [[Provisional IRA]] in Massachusetts and [[Omar Abdel-Rahman]].<ref>{{cite web|last=Perez|first=Richard|url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F04E3DC1539F931A35753C1A963958260|title=A Gamble Pays Off as the Prosecution Uses an Obscure 19th-Century Law|work=New York Times|date=2 October 1995|accessdate=8 April 2010}}</ref> ==Background== Since [[World War I]], the federal government has won numerous seditious conspiracy cases against [[Pro-Independence Movement|Puerto Rican independentistas]], [[Communism|communists]] and others.<ref>Leonard Zeskind. ''Blood and Politics: The History of the White Nationalist Movement from the Margins to the Mainstream.'' pp. 144−171. Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 2009.</ref> ==Notable cases== *In 1936, [[Pedro Albizu Campos]], a [[Puerto Rican people|Puerto Rican]] [[Puerto Rican Nationalist Party|Nationalist]], and nine others were charged with forcibly attempting to overthrow the Government of the United States in [[Puerto Rico]] and were jailed for 10 years in [[Atlanta, Georgia]]. *In 1980, Puerto Rican Nationalist [[Carmen Valentín Pérez]] and nine other women and men were charged with seditious conspiracy for attempting to overthrow the government of the United States in Puerto Rico, and were each given sentences of up to 90 years in prison.<ref>[http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/43/003.html ''ProLIBERTAD: ProLIBERTAD Campaign for the Freedom of Puerto Rican Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War: Arm the Spirit''] 30 October 1995. Hartford-hwp.com May 29, 2013.</ref> *[[Fort Smith sedition trial]] - Ten white supremacists were indicted for seditious conspiracy in 1987 for crimes in related to [[The Order (white supremacist group)|The Order]] and [[The Covenant, The Sword, and the Arm of the Lord]]. All ten defendants and four other defendants indicted for different crimes were acquitted in April 1988 after a two-month trial. *On 1 October 1995, Sheik [[Omar Abdel-Rahman]], a prominent [[Muslim]] cleric, and nine others were convicted of seditious conspiracy.<ref>Richard Perez, "The Terror Conspiracy&mdash;The Charges&mdash;A Gamble Pays Off as the Prosecution Uses an Obscure 19th-Century Law", ''[[The New York Times]]'', October 2, 1995.</ref> They had been accused of [[1993 World Trade Center bombing|terrorist plots in New York City]]. *On 29 March 2010, nine members of [[Hutaree]] were charged with seditious conspiracy.<ref>"Nine Members of a Militia Group Charged with Seditious Conspiracy and Related Offenses", press release, [[United States Department of Justice]], March 29, 2010.</ref> *Some participants in the 6 January 2021 [[2021 storming of the United States Capitol|storming of the United States Capitol]] are currently being investigated with the possibility of sedition and conspiracy charges.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/12/politics/justice-department-us-capitol-breach-list/index.html |title=Key takeaways from the stunning Justice Department news conference on the US Capitol breach |first=Paul |last=LeBlanc |date=January 12, 2021 |website=CNN |access-date=January 12, 2021}}</ref> Edit Susan Lisa Rosenberg (born 5 October 1955)[1] is an American activist, writer, advocate for social justice and prisoners' rights and a former terrorist. From the late 1970s into the mid-1980s, Rosenberg was active in the far-left revolutionary terrorist May 19th Communist Organization ("M19CO"), which according to a contemporaneous FBI report "openly advocate[d] the overthrow of the U.S. Government through armed struggle and the use of violence".[2] M19CO provided support to an offshoot of the Black Liberation Army, including in armored truck robberies, and later engaged in bombings of government buildings.[3] After living as a fugitive for two years, Rosenberg was arrested in 1984 while in possession of a large cache of explosives and firearms. She had also been sought as an accomplice in the 1979 prison escape of Assata Shakur and in the 1981 Brink's robbery that resulted in the deaths of two police and a guard,[4] although she was never charged in either case. Rosenberg was sentenced to 58 years' imprisonment on the weapons and explosives charges. She spent 16 years in prison, during which she became a poet, author, and AIDS activist. Her sentence was commuted to time served by President Bill Clinton on January 20, 2001,[5] his final day in office.[6][7] ==See also== *[[List of conspiracies (political)]] *[[Sedition]] ==References== {{reflist}} == Sources == * Avrich, Paul, ''Sacco and Vanzetti: The Anarchist Background'' (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991) ==External links== *[http://codes.lp.findlaw.com/uscode/18/I/115/2384 18 U.S.C. § 2384 : US Code - Section 2384: Seditious conspiracy] [[Category:Conspiracy (criminal)]] [[Category:Sedition]] [[Category:United States federal criminal law]] [[Category:Terrorism in the United States]]'