The controversial clauses of Girard’s will established a college for impoverished white male orphans between the ages of six and ten years. In addition to specifying the subject matter to be taught, the will barred clergymen of any denomination from holding any post within the college and from visiting the premises. Girard also bequeathed $500,000 to be invested and the income therefrom applied to the construction, lighting, and paving of a street in eastern Philadelphia, fronting the Delaware River, to be called “Delaware Ave- nue.” He also gave $300,000 to the Common- wealth of Pennsylvania to improve canal navigation. To implement these provisions, Girard bequeathe d the residue and remainder of his real and PERSONAL PROPERTY to the mayor, aldermen, and citizens of Philadelphia in trust. The heirs of Girard instituted an action to have the devise of the residue of the real property to the mayor, aldermen, and citizens of Philadelphia in trust be declared void, on the theory that the recipients lacked the capacity to take lands by devise; or if they were deemed capable of taking by devise for their own benefit, they lacked capacity to take the lands in trust. The plaintiffs also asserted that because the beneficiaries of the charity for which the lands were devised in trust were ambiguous, indefinite, and vague, the will had not created a trust that could be executed or recognized at law or in EQUITY. The complaint sought the establishment of a RESULTING TRUST for the heirs, an accounting, and other relief. This case contained three principal issues. The initial question focused on whether the corporation of the city of Philadelphia had the capacity to take the real and personal property for the construction and maintenance of a college pursuant to the trust established by the will. The second issue centered on whether the charitable purpose s were valid and capable of being effectuated in accordance with the laws of Pennsylvania. The third issue involved the effect of the invalidation of the trust upon a findin g that it violated Pennsylvania law, in terms of whether the property would fall into the residue of the estate and belong to the corporation of the city through the RESIDUARY CLAUSE of the will or belong, as a resulting trust, to the heirs of Girard. With respect to the first issue, the Court held that where a corporation has the legal capacity to take real or personal property, it can accept it and administer it in trust to the same extent and in the same manner as a private person might execute a trust. The act of March 11, 1789, that incorporated the city of Phila- delphia expressly conferred upon it the power to own and otherwise benefit from real and personal property. The Court noted that if the trust were inconsistent with the purposes for which the corporatio n was established, the trust itself would not be void, assuming that it was otherwise va lid. Rather, a court, in the exercise of its equity jurisdiction, would simply order the substitution of a new trustee to execute the trust. The Pennsylvania legislature passed the acts of March 24 and April 4, 1832, to implement particular improvements and execute certain trusts, pursuant to Girard’s will. The Court acknowledged that this legislation was not a judicial decision entitled to the full force and effect of such but indicated that it was a legislative RATIFICATION of the compete ncy of the corporation to take the property and implement the trusts. If the trusts were other- wise valid, the legislature could not challenge the competency of the corporation in this regard. In addition, neither the heirs nor any other private persons could contest the right of the corporation to take the property or to administer the trusts. This right was reserved solely for the state in its sovereign capacity. The second issue involved a challenge of the trusts on the theory that because the Statute of Charitable Uses was not in effect in Pennsylva- nia, no charitable trust could be created. The Statute of Charitable Uses validated charitable trusts and trusts that did not have an existence apart from that statute and its successors. As a result, if the statute had been expressly repealed or had been declared not a part of the COMMON LAW of a particular state, no charitable trust could be established in that state. The Court, however, rejected this theory and stated that charitable uses were known and upheld prior to the Statute of Charitable Uses; the statute merely acknowledged the existence of such uses and provided for their enforcement. The Court cited the then recent report of the Commis- sioners of Public Records in England, which contained a collection of early Chancery cases involving charitable trusts, to support this finding and to dispose of the plaintiffs’ con- tention that the trust was void because the beneficiaries were too uncertain and indefin ite GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION 238 VIDAL V. GIRARD’ S EXECUTORS for the bequest to have any legal effect. These early cases showed that charitable uses were valid at common law and enforceable in Chancery pursuant to the GENERAL JURISDICTION of the court. The Court of Chancery exercised such jurisdiction both before and after the enactment of the Statute of Charitable Uses. The cases also established that the Court of Chancery enforced charitable trusts created for the benefit of general and indefinite charities, as well as for specific charities. Chancery had also upheld trusts in cases where either no trustees were appointed or the trustees were not competent to execute the trust. In terms of the second issue, the heirs also asserted that the trust that established the college for orphans was void because its terms violated the constitution, the common law, and the PUBLIC POLICY of Pennsylvania. The pur- ported violations consisted of: (1) excluding all religious personnel of any sect from positions within the college or from visiting the premises, and (2) limiting instruction to purely moral concepts of goodness, truth, and honor, thereby implicitly excluding all instruction in the Christian religion. The Court ruled that Girard had adopted a position of neutrality with respect to the exclusion of all religious influence from the administration of the college. He had not explicitly impugned Christianity, which, in a qualified sense, was a part of the common law of Pennsylvania, or any other religion. Rather, he had merely wanted the students to remain free from sectarian controversy and wished them to study a curriculum that did not place inordinate emphasis on religious subjects. He did not proscribe members of the laity from teaching the general principles of Christianity or analyzing the Bible from a historical perspective. The Court concluded that Girard’s provisions did not contravene the laws, the constitution, or the public policy of Pennsylvania. The Court affirmed the ruling of the lower court upholding the trust and thereby deemed it unnecessary to examine the third issue in this case, which involved the question of to whom the property would belong if the trust were declared void. Legal observers are divided over the histori- cal importance of this case. At a high level, the court was asked to determine the proper role of religion in public schools. On the one hand, it upheld the use of the Bible and the teaching of Christian moral principl es in a city-run school, a holding that might run afoul of modern constitutional sensitivities. On the other hand, the decision permitted the teaching of the Bible in a nonsectarian way, thereby accommodating religion in a manner similar to some of the recent decisions under the Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses of the FIRST AMENDMENT. Either way, the Girard decision represents another instance of how church and state in America become entangled despite the Consti- tution’s mandate to keep them separate. FURTHER READINGS Weaver, Russell L. and Donald E. Lively. 2009. Understand- ing the First Amendment. 3d ed. new Providence, N.J. Wilson, George. 1996. Stephen Girard: The Life and Times of America’s First Tycoon. Cambridge, Mass.: Da Capo. CROSS REFERENCES Chancery; Complaint; Corporations; Equity; Trus tee. VIETNAM WAR The Vietnam War was a 30-year conflict (1945– 1975) in Southeast Asia that was fought mostly inside the boundaries of Vietnam but often involved the use of military troops and military equipment from other countries including France, the United States, and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). The North Vietnamese sought the reunification of the two countries under its form of rule. The United States, determined to prevent Communist aggression, supported the government of South Vietnam and in the early 1960s became increasingly involved militarily in the conflict. By 1965, U.S. involvement had escalated, and U.S. armed forces had been introduced. Oppo- sition to the war in the United States grew steadily, resulting in one of the most divisive periods in U.S. history. The United States ultimately withdrew its forces in 1973. Within two years, the North Vietna mese defeated the South Vietnamese armed forces and took control of the country. The War in Vietnam During WORLD WAR II, the Viet Minh, a nationalist party seeking an end to French colonial rule of Vietnam, was organized. When the Allied powers defeated Japan in 1945, Japanese troops withdrew from what was then known as French Indochina. As a result, the Viet Minh, under the leadership of Ho Ch i GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION VIETNAM WAR 239 Minh, formally declared independence. France refused to recognize Vietnamese independence, and war broke out between the French and the Viet Minh. In 1954 France suffered a devastat- ing defeat in the battle of Dien Bien Phu, which forced the French to sign a peace treaty and withdraw their troops. The peace treaty also split the country in two, officially divided at the 17th parallel, with a Communist-controlled government under Ho Chi Minh in North Vietnam and a pro-Western government under Ngo Dinh Diem in South Vietnam. After the French withdrawal, participants at an international conference in Geneva, Switzer- land, divided Vietnam at the 17th parallel. The Viet Minh were given control of the north, which became known as North Vietnam, while the non-Communist southern half became South Vietnam. The South Vietnamese govern- ment was headed by Prime Minister Ngo Dinh Diem, who refused to allow free elections on the issue of reunif ication in 1956 as agreed by the Geneva Accords. Diem rightly feared that Ho Chi Minh and the Communists would win the election. The United States supported Diem’s defiance, which led the North Vietnamese to seek unification through military force. The Diem regime, which soon proved to be corrupt and ineffective, had difficulty fighting the Viet Cong, a South Vietnamese army of guerrilla soldiers who were trained and armed by the North Vietnamese. The Vi et Cong became part of the National Liberation Front (NLF), a Communist-backed insurgent organi- zation. In 1961 President JOHN F. KENNEDY began to send more U.S. military advisers to South Vietnam, and by the end of 1962 their number had risen from 900 to 11,000. Kennedy, however, was dissatisfied with the Diem regime and allowed a military coup to occur on November 1, 1963. Diem was assassinated during the coup, but none of the lackluster military leaders who followed him was able to stop the Communists from gaining more ground. Direct U.S. military involvement in Vietnam began in 1964. On August 2, 1964, President LYNDON B. JOHNSON announced that North Vietnamese ships had attacked U.S. naval vessels in the Gulf of Tonkin. Johnson asked Congress for the authority to employ any necessary course of action to safeguard U.S. troops. Based on what turned out to be inaccurate informa- tion supplied by the Johnson administration, Congress gave the president this authority in the TONKIN GULF RESOLUTION (78 Stat. 384). Johnson used this resolution to justify military escalation in the absence of a congres- sional declaration of war. Following attacks on U.S. forces in February 1965, he authorized the bombing of North Vietnam. To continue the protection of the South Vietnamese govern- ment, Johnson increased the number of U.S. soldiers fighting in South Vietnam from 20,000 to 500,000 during the next three years. U.S. military leaders had difficulty fighting a guerrilla army, yet repeatedly claimed that Viet Cong and North Vietnamese forces were losing the war. On January 30, 1968, the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese made a surprise Vietnam War Timeline 1954 French Indochina War ends with French defeat at Dien Bien Phu. 1955 United States agrees to help train South Vietnamese army. 1956 President Eisenhower announces first U.S. advisers sent to Vietnam. 1957 North Vietnamese guerrilla (Vietcong) activity directed against South Vietnam begins. 1959 First U.S. military advisers killed in Vietcong attack. 1961 President Kennedy agrees to increase 685-member military advisory group and to arm and supply 20,000 South Vietnamese troops (June 16); first U.S. aircraft carrier arrives off Vietnam with armed helicopters to aid the South Vietnamese army. 1962 President Kennedy states that U.S. military advisers in Vietnam will return fire if fired upon. U.S. noncombat troops number 12,000 by year’s end. 1963 South Vietnam president Ngo Dinh Diem assassinated (Nov. 2). 1964 North Vietnamese patrol boats attack U.S. destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin. U.S. Congress passes resolution (Aug. 7) that President Johnson uses as basis for later U.S. troop buildup in Vietnam. United States announces massive aid increase to counter Hanoi’s support of Vietcong (Dec. 11). 1965 First U.S. air attacks in North Vietnam begin (Feb. 24); first major deployment of U.S. ground troops (March 7–9). U.S. troops number 184,300 at year’s end. 1966 Bombing of Hanoi begins (June 29). U.S. troops number 389,000 at year’s end. 1967 U.S. troops number 480,000 at year’s end. 1968 “Tet” offensive by North Vietnamese (Jan. 30 to Feb. 29); My Lai massacre by U.S. troops (March 16). Start of Paris peace talks. 1969 U.S. troop deployment reaches highest point of the war in April: 543,000. President Nixon begins U.S. troop withdrawal on May 14. 1970 U.S. and South Vietnamese forces cross Cambodian border to get at enemy bases (April 30). 1971 U.S. bombers strike massively in North Vietnam for alleged violations of 1968 bombing halt agreement (Dec. 26 to 30). U.S. troops number 140,000 at year’s end. 1972 North Vietnamese launch bombing offensive across demilitarized zone (March 30). U.S. resumes bombing of Hanoi (April 15); U.S. announces mining of North Vietnam ports. Last U.S. combat troops leave (Aug. 11). 1973 Cease-fire accord signed (Jan. 27); last non-combat U.S. troops withdraw from Vietnam (March 29); last U.S. prisoners of war released (April 1). Some U.S. civilians remain. 1975 President Theu’s government of South Vietnam surrenders to Communists April 30; United States abandons embassy. All U.S. civilians leave Vietnam. 140,000 South Vietnamese refugees flown to United States. 1976 Vietnam reunified; large-scale resettlement and reeducation programs started. SOURCE: Dupuy, R. Ernestand Trevor N. Dupuy, Harper Encyclopedia of Military H istory; New York Public Librar y ’s Book of Chronologies. ILLUSTRATION BY GGS CREATIVE RESOURCES. REPRODUCED BY PER- MISSION OF GALE, A PART OF CENGAGE LEARNING. GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3 RD E DITION 240 VIETNAM WAR attack on 36 major cities and towns during the Tet (lunar new year) festival. Though U.S. troops repelled these attacks, the Tet offensive undermined the credibility of U.S. military leaders and of Johnson himself, who had claimed the war was close to being won. Antiwar sentiment in the United States grew after Tet as the public became skeptical about whether the war could be won and, if it could, how many years it would take to achieve victory. The 1968 presidential campaign of Minne- sota antiwar senator EUGENE MCCARTHY gained popularity after Tet. On March 31, 1968, Johnson announced that the United States would stop bombing North Vietnam above the 20th parallel and that he would not seek re-election to the presidency. Johnson ordered a total bombing halt in October, when North Vietnam agreed to begin preliminary peace talks in Paris. Thes e discussions dragged on during the fall election campaign, which saw Republi- can RICHARD M. NIXON elected president. Nixon sought to preserve the South Viet- namese government while withdrawing U.S. troops. He began a policy of “Vietnamization,” which promised to gradually transfer all military operations to the South Vietnamese. During this process, the United States would provide massive amounts of military aid. In 1969, when the number of U.S. military personnel in South Vietnam had reached 540,000, Nixon announced a modest troop withdrawal. During 1969, the Paris peace talks continued with the NLF, North Vietnamese, and South Vietnam- ese, but little progress was made. The year 1969 also marked when the media began revealing details of the MY LAI MASSACRE, a mass MURDER conducted by a unit of the U.S. Army on March 16, 1968, of 347 to 504 unarmed citizens in South Vietnam, all of whom were civilians and a majority of whom were women, children, and elderly people. In the sprin g of 1970, Nixon expanded the war as U.S. and South Vietnamese forces invaded Cambodia to destroy North Vietnam- ese military sanctuaries there. The invasion of Cambodia created a firestorm on U.S. college and university campuses, where antiwar pro- tests led to the closing of many institutions for the remainder of the spring. Student pro- tests reached a fever pitch in May 1970, when the Ohio NATIONAL GUARD fired 67 rounds at unarmed college students at Kent State University in Ohio. Four students were killed, two of whom had participated in antiwar protests. The other two students killed w ere merely walking to class. The Kent State killings combined with revelations of the My Lai Massacre to help spread antiwar sentiment through a greater cross section of America. Nevertheless, Nixon persevered with his policies. He authorized the bombing of Cam- bodia and Laos by B-52 bombers, destabilizing the Cambod ian government and de stroying large sections of both countries. By late 1970 the number of U.S. military personnel in South Vietnam had declined to 335,000. A year later, the number had dropped to 160,000 military personnel. In March 1972 the North Vietnamese invaded the northern section of South Vietnam and the central highlands. Nixon responded by ordering the mining of Haiphong and other North Vietnamese ports andlarge-scale bombing of North Vietnam. In the fall of 1972, a peace treaty appeared likely, but the talks broke off in mid-December. Nixo n then ordered intense bombing of Hanoi and other North Vietnamese cities. The “Ch ristmas bombing” lasted 11 days. The peace talks then resumed, and on January 27, 1973, the parties agreed to a cease- fire the following day, the withdrawal of all U.S. forces, the release of all prisoners of war, and the creation of an international force to keep the peace. The South Vietnamese were to have the right to determine their own future, but North American soldiers exit a helicopter during Operation Oregon in the Vietnam War. More than 47,000 military personnel were killed in action during the war. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3 RD E DITION VIETNAM WAR 241 Vietnamese troops stationed in the south could remain. By the end of 1973, almost all U.S. military personnel had left South Vietnam. The conflict in the south continued in 1974. The United States cut military aid to South Vietnam in August 1974, resulting in the demoralization of the South Vietnamese army. The North Vietnamese, sensing that the end was near, attacked a provincial capital 60 miles north of Saigon in December 1974. After the city of Phouc Binh fell in early January 1975, the North Vietnamese launched a full-scale offen- sive in the central highlands in March. The South Vietnamese army fell apart, and a general Westmoreland v. Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc. O B n January 23, 1982, CBS television broadcast a 90-minute documentary entitled The Un- counted Enemy: A Vietnam Deception. The program was produced by George Crile and based in large part on the reporting of Sam Adams, a Pentagon analyst who had acted as a CBS consultant for the program. Mike Wallace from 60 Minutes was the narrator. He also conducted some of the interviews. The documentary reported charges by a number of U.S. Army and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) intelligence sources, who claimed that prior to the surprise North Vietnamese-Vi et Cong led Tet Offensive in January 1968, the U.S. Military Assis- tance Command in Vietnam, also known as MACV, conspired to m islead President Lyndon B. Johnson, the American public, and the rest of the military about the enemy’s actual strength. The witnesses interviewed for the documentary stated that MACV carried out this deception to make it appear that progress was being made in winning the war of attrition against enemy forces, that the war could be won, and that there was “ some light at the end of the tunnel” in what was the longest war in U.S. history. The documentary made clear that not only was MACV under the control and command of General William C. Westmoreland but that the conspiracy to understate enemy troop strength was carried out at least with Westmoreland’s knowledge, acquiescence, and tacit approval. The documentary then charged that the Tet Offensive might have been less surprising and demoralizing had MACV been providing accurate information. Since many historians and military experts consider theTetOffensivetobethewar’s f inal turning poin t, the documentary suggested that Westmoreland played a significant role in the U.S. defeat in Vietnam. In the preface to the broadcast, correspondent Mike Wallace stated: “The fact is tha t we Amer- icans were misinformed about the nature and the size of the enemy we were facing, and tonight we’re going to present evidence of what we have come to believe was a conscious e ffort—in deed, a conspir- acy at the highest levels of American military intelligence—to suppress and alter critical intelli- gence of the enemy in the year lea ding up to the Tet Offensive.” Three days later, General Westmoreland held a press conference attended by former CIA special assistant George Carver, former senior CIA officials, a former amb assador to Vietnam, and some of the general’s principal intelligence people during the war. We stmoreland and his supporters denounced the program as filled w ith lies, distortions, fraudu- lent statements that constituted a hoax on the public. Westmore land and the others criticized the documentary o n four grounds. They alleged that (1) one of the interviews had been rehearsed; (2) one of the witnesses was interviewed after being allowed to see t he interviews of the other witnesses; (3) there was insufficient notice to General Westmore- land of the scope of his interview; and (4) certain answers were improperly spliced and edited. CBS News decided to conduct an i nternal investigation, appointing senior editor Burton Benja- min to coordinate it. On July 7, 1982, Benjamin submitted his findings to Van Gordon Sauter, the president of CBS News. Eight days laterSauter issued a statement expressing regret that the documentary had failed to comply with certain journalistic standards ordinarily followed by CBS. However, GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION 242 VIETNAM WAR panic ensued, with the U.S. embassy staging a mass evacuation of its diplomats and supporters by the end of April 1976. On April 30, the South Vietnamese government surrendered; on July 2, the country w as officially united as the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. In the aftermath of reunification, several hundred thousand South Vietnamese government officials, military offi- cers, and soldiers were sent to “reeducation camps,” where torture, disease, malnutrition, and death were widespread. In sum, more than 47,000 U.S. military personnel were killed in action during the war and nearly 11,000 died of other causes. Sauter emphasized that the program contained no fal sehoods or distortions of the truth. In Septem- ber, CBS offered to General Westmoreland 15 minutes of unedited airtime to respond to the documentary, whi ch was to be followed by a 45 minute panel discussion about the criticisms and merits of the broadcast. The general declined the offer. On September 13, 1982, Westmoreland filed a $120 million lawsuit against CBS, alleging that the Vietnam documentary had made 16 libelous state- ments against him. But statements that accused the general of ha ving conspired to understate enemy troop strength constituted the centerpiece of the lawsuit. Although Westmoreland filed the lawsuit in his home state of South Carolina, CBS successfully moved the case to a federal district court in New York for trial. Westmoreland’s suit was funded in part by the Capital Le gal Foundation, a c onservative think tank headed by Dan Burt, who also served as the gen eral’s l awyer. CBS was represented by the law firm of C ravath, Swaine, & Moore. Discovery began immediately and continued for a year and a half. Hundreds of witnesses w ere interviewed and deposed throughout the country and the world. It was an exhaustive preparation f or both sides. In the summer of 1984, the defense moved for summary judgment. Its memorandum of law ran just under 400 pages—not including volumes of exhibits. On September 24, 1984, Judge Pierre Leval d enied the motion, concluding that the complaint contained several triable issues for the jury. Leval said it was the jury ’sprovinceto determine whether certain statements of fact contained in the documentary were true, and, if proven to be false, whether they were made with “actual malice”, t he two lynchpins of any libel case involving a public figure. The case came to trial on October 9, 1984, and concluded on February 17, 1985. Just as the case wasabouttogotothejury,thetwosidessettled their differe nces, each side claiming it had proven its major points. A s part of the settlement, CBS agreed to issue the following written statement: “CBS respects General Westmoreland’slongand faithful service to his country an d never intended to assert, and does not believe, that General West- moreland was unpatriotic or disloyal in p erforming his duties as he saw them.” CBS then conducted a second internal investigation over the matter. This time it found that the program was “seriously flawed” and out of balance. It admitted that “conspiracy” had not been proven, frie ndly witnesses had been coddled, and those opposing the program’s thesis were treated harshly. Despite these findings, Mike Wallace stood by the program. Perhaps no other libel case in the twentieth century attained the celebrity of Westmoreland’s libel suit. Born in Spartanburg County, South Carolina, and a 1936 graduate of West P oint, General Westmoreland gained a reputation for superb staff work and sound battle leadership during World War II, in which he particip ated in the North Africa, Sicily, and Normandy campaigns. He served as commander of U.S. forces in Vietnam from June of 1964 until June of 1968 and was the primary advocate for escalating U.S. troop involve- ment in South Vietnam during tha t peri od. He was Time magazine’s Man of the Year for 1965. FURTHER READINGS Adler, Renata. 1988. Reckless Disregard: Westmoreland v. CBS et al., Sharon v. Time. New York: Vintage Books. Brewin, Bob. 1987. Vietnam on Trial: Westmoreland vs. CBS. New York: Atheneum. Roth, M. Patricia. 1986. The Juror and the General. New York: Morrow. CROSS REFERENCE Libel and Slander. B GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION VIETNAM WAR 243 Approximately 200,000 South Vietnamese mili- tary personnel were killed, and 900,000 North Vietnamese and Viet Cong soldiers lost their lives. The civilian population was devastated by the war. An estimated 1 million North and South Vietnamese civilians were killed during the war. Large parts of the countryside were destroyed through bombing and the U.S. spraying of chemical defoliants such as Agent Orange. The War and U.S. Law The war provoked many legal and constitutional controversies in the United States. Though the U.S. Supreme Court refused to decide whether the war was constitutional, it did rule on several war-related issues.In United Statesv. O’Brien, 391 U.S. 367, 88 S. Ct. 1673, 20 L. Ed. 2d 672 (1968), the Court upheld the conviction of David Paul O’Brien for violating a 1965 amendment to the Selective Service Act (50 U.S.C.A. App. § 451 et seq.) prohibiting any draft registrant from knowingly destroying or mutilating his draft card. The Court rejected O’Brien’s contention that his burning of his draft card was SYMBOLIC SPEECH protected bythe FIRST AMENDMENT.InTINKER V . DES MOINES INDEPENDENT COMMUNITY SCHOOL DISTRICT , 393 U.S. 503, 89 S. Ct. 733, 21 L. Ed. 2d 731 (1969), however, the Court ruled that high-school students had the First Amendment right to wear black armbands to school to protest U.S. involvement in Vietnam. In WELSH V. UNITED STATES, 398 U.S. 333, 90 S. Ct. 1792, 26 L. Ed. 2d 308 (1970), the Court held that a person could be exempted from compulsory military service based on purely moral or ethical beliefs against war. One ofthe most significant Court decisions of the Vietnam Warperiod involved the publication of the Pentagon Papers, a highly classified government report on the history of U.S. involvement in Vietnam. The Nixon administra- tion sought to preven t the New York Times and the Washington Post from publishing excerpts from the study on the ground that publication would hurt national security interests. In NEW YORK TIMES V . UNITED STATES, 403 U.S . 713, 91 S. Ct. 2140, 29 L. Ed. 2d 822 (1971), the Supreme Court, by a 6–3 vote, held that the government’s efforts to block publication amounted to an unconstitutional PRIOR RESTRAINT. The War and U.S. Politics The Vietnam War continues to shape American politics as well. Almost every presidential election since the end of the Vietnam War has involved allegations by one presidential candidate that his opponent’s views on foreign policy risk involving the United States in “another Vietnam.” Because such allegations are used by both Democratic and Republican politicians,the allegationsthemselves have taken on a variety of meanings. Sometimes the allegations are meant to accuse a politician of seeking war against a small country in which U.S. interests are not clearly at stake. Politician s may also be accused of seeking to start “another Vietnam” if they urge the United States to take military action without a clear path to victory. Most often, however, politicians invoke the Vietnam War as a means of broadly associating an opponent’s view with a military undertaking that ended in failure. FURTHER READINGS Belknap, Michal R. 2002. The Vietnam War on Trial: The My Lai Massacre and the Court-Martial of Lieutenant Calley. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas. Caputo, Philip. 1987. A Rumor of War. New York: Ballantine Books. FitzGerald, Frances. 1973. Fire in the Lake: The Vietnamese and the Americans in Vietnam. New York: Random House. Hawley, Thomas M. 2003. “Accounting for Absent Bodies: The Politics and Jurisprudence of the Missing Persons Act.” Studies in Law, Politics, and Society 28 (spring). Solis, Gary D. 2000. “Military Justice, Civilian Clemency: The Sentences of Marine Corps War Crimes in South Vietnam.” Transnational Law & Contemporary Problems 10 (spring). CROSS REFERENCES Cold War; Communism; Conscientious Objector; Kis- singer, Henry; New York Times Co. v. United States; Prior Restraint. VIGILANTISM Taking the law into one’s own hands and attempting to effect justice according to one’s own understanding of right and wrong; action taken by a voluntary association of persons who organize themselves for the purpose of protect ing a common interest, such as liberty, property, or personal security; action taken by an individual or group to protest existing law; action taken by an individual or group to enforce a higher law than that enacted by society’s designated lawmaking institutions; private enforceme nt of legal norms in the absence of an established, reliable, and effective law enforcement body. The foundation of the American legal system rests on the RULE OF LAW, a concept GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION 244 VIGILANTISM embodied in the notion that the United States is a nation of laws and not of men. Under the rule of law , laws are thought to exist independent of, and separate from, human will. Even when the human element factors into legal decision making, the decision maker is expected to be constrained by the law in making his or her decision. In other words, police officers, judges, and juries should act according to the law and not according to their personal preferences or private agendas. State and federal governments are given what amounts to a monopoly over the use of force and violence to implement the law. Private citizens may use force and violence to defend their lives and their property, and in some instances the lives and property of others, but they must do so under the specific circumstances allowed by the law if they wish to avoid being prosecuted for a crime themselves. Private individuals may also make “citizen arrests,” but the circumstances in which the law authorizes them to do so are very narrow. Citizens are often limited to making arrests for felonies committed in their presence. By taking law into their own hands, vigilantes flout the rule of law, effectively becoming lawmaker, police officer, judge, jury, and appel- late court for the cause they are pursuing. The history of vigilantism in the United States is as old as the country itself. In many ways, the history of the United States began with vigilantism. On December 16, 1773, American colonists, tired of British direct taxation, took part in what came to be known as the Boston Tea Party. As part of the resistance, they threw 342 chests of tea into Boston Harbor. During the 1830s, so-called “vigilance committees” formed in the South to protect the institution of SLAVERY against encroachment by abolitionists, who were routinely assaulted, tarred and feathered, and otherwise terrorized by these committees with the ACQUIESCENCE of local law enforcement personnel. After slavery was abolished, southern vigilante groups , such as the KU KLUX KLAN, sought to continue white dominance over freed blacks by using LYNCHING and other forms of intimidation that were prohibited by law. During the second half of the twentieth century, African American vigilantes wantonly destroyed symbols of white authority and property associated with white society in retaliation for the injuries and indignities caused by racial SEGREGATION and DISCRIMINATION. A 37-year-old New York man named Bernhard Goetz was at the center of perhaps the most famous act of vigilantism in recent American history. On December 22, 1984, four African American teenage boys approached Goetz on a Manhattan subway and demanded that he give them five dollars. After a second request for money, Goetz, who had prior firearms and target shooting experience, as- sumed a two-handed combat stance and fired five shots, striking each of the four men, none of whom was armed. All four teenagers survived, though one of them was permanently paralyzed and suffered brain damage as a result of a bullet that severed his spinal cord. Goetz surrendered to police nine days later and was eventually charged with attempted MURDER, ASSAULT, reckless endangerment, and several gun crimes. A Manhattan jury found him not guilty of all charges except an illegal firearms possession count, for which he served two-thirds of a one-year sentence.Goetz andothershavecited his actions as a contributing factor to the groundswell movement against urban crime and disorder and to successful NATIONAL RIFLE ASSOCIA- TION (NRA) campaigns to loosen restrictions on the concealed carrying of firearms. Goetz also came to symbolize New Yorkers’ frustrations with the high crime rates of the mid-1980s. Vigilantism continues to metamorphose. Private watch groups patrol their neighbor- hoods to guard against criminal activity. The Guardian Angels, a non-profit organization, is the most well-known such group. The Guardian Angels are volunteer organization of unarmed citizen crime patrollers. The organization was founded on February 13, 1979, in New York, by Curtis Sliwa and has chapters in 11 countries and in over 100 cities around the world. In most cities, the Guardian Angels patrol the streets attempting to detect and deter ordinary crimes, such as ROBBERY and assault. But over the past ten years, they have been enlisted on occasion to help protect against political violence, such as that perpetrat ed by anti-abortion extremists. Anti-abortion extremists commit deadly attacks against family HEALTH CARE clinics and family health care workers, often in the name of religion. Environmental activists inflict eco- nomic losses on companies by obstructing lawful business activities that they think will cause harm to the air, water, or land. Every day, people use force and violence to exact revenge against someone whom they believe has done GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION VIGILANTISM 245 them wrong. In each case, vigilantes take it upon themselves to enact justice, rather than enlist police officers, lawyers, judges, and the rest of the established legal machinery to do the job. And, in each case, vigilantes risk starting a cycle of violence and lawlessness in which the victims of vigilantism take the law into their own hands to exact payback. The motivations underlying acts of vigilan- tism vary according to the individual vigilante. Some vigilantes seek to carry out personal agendas to protest existing law. Others seek to enforce existing law as they interpret, define, or understand it. Still others seek to implement or call attention to some kind of higher law that they feel overrules the norms established by society’s designated lawmaking institutions. Since no state or federal jurisdiction offers any kind of “vigilante defense” to criminal prosecu- tion, vigilantes must rely on the moral rectitude of their cause to justify their acts. Yet, the morality of most acts of vigilantism is relative to whether one is the perpetrator or vic tim of vigilantism, as the targets of vigilantism rarely agree that the acts were justified. The moral relativity associated with vigilan- tism is not as evident in less technological societies where vigilantism is simply equated with action taken by private residents to maintain security and order in the community, or otherwise to promote community welfare. For example, during much of the nineteenth century, local governments in the western United States were decentralized and loosely organized at best. As part of this often makeshift political order, certain indiv iduals or groups of individuals took it upon themselves to provide summary justice for alleged victims of criminal activity. Some of the individuals accused of wrongdoing, and rounded up by this posse-style system of justice, were no doubt unhappy with the justice that was dispensed. However, these vigilante groups were prevalent in this particular region of the country, making them the norm and not the exception. As a result, such groups were typically more widely accepted than vigilante movements in other eras. FURTHER READINGS Abrams, R. G. 1999. Vigilant Citizens: Vigilantism and the State. Malden, Mass.: Polity Press. Culberson, William C. 1990. Vigilantism: Political History of Private Power in the United States. New York: Greenwood. Safire, William. 1985. “Up the Ante.” San Francisco Chronicle (February). Tankebe, Justice. 2009. “Self-Help, Policing, and Procedural Justice: Ghanaian Vigilantism and the Rule of Law.” Law and Society Review (June). VILL In old ENGLISH LAW, a division of a hundred or wapentake; a town or a city. v VINSON, FREDERICK MOORE As the thirteenth chief justice, Frederick Moore Vinson led the U.S. Supreme Court from 1946 to 1953. Vinson rose to the Court after a long career as a lawyer, district attorney, member of Congress, federal appellate judge, and secretary of the treasury. His no mination to the Supreme Court by President HARRY S. TRUMAN followed a dramatic controversy over filling the position, and Vinson inherited a sharply divided Court. His effectiveness as an administrator helped hold the justices together. Because he was generally disinterested in writing opinions, however, critics have judged his tenure harshly. Despite his liberal attitudes during his political career, he emerged as a predominantly conse r- vative justice except for his support of CIVIL RIGHTS . Born on January 22, 1890, in Louisa, Kentucky, Vinson was the so n of a jailer. He graduated from Kentucky Normal College in 1908. In 1909 and 1911, he earned bachelor of arts and laws degrees from Center College in Danville, Kentucky, with the highest marks ever recorded at that school. Establishing his law practice in his hometown, he practiced law for two years before serving as city attorney in 1913 and as district attorney from 1921 to 1924. In the mid-1920s, Vinson’s visibility as a prosecutor led him into national politics. He represented Kentucky in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1923 to 1929 and again from 1931 to 1937. In his last four terms in Congress, he was a strong backer of President FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT’s liberal economic recov- ery program, known popularly as the NEW DEAL. The support engen dered a long relationship between the two men. In 1937 Roosevelt appointed Vinson to the federal bench, and he served from 1937 to 1943 on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. He became chief justice of the U.S. Emergency Court of Appeals in 1942 and the following year GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION 246 VILL joined the Roosevelt administration as head of the Office of Economic Stabilization. A series of administrative positions culminated with Vin- son’s appointment as secretary of the treasury under President Truman in 1945. In 1946 the death of Chief Justice HARLAN F. STONE set off a controversy over who should be his successor. The question for Truman was whether he should elevate an associate justice or select an outsider. Two associate justices— ROBERT H. JACKSON and HUGO L. BLACK—were known to want the job, and each threatened to resign if the other were nominated. To settle the conflict, Truman turned to Vinson, who had both the requisite experience and a calm temperament. Vinson’s record ofsupport fora strong federal government was also important to Truman. During his seven years on the Court, Vinson more or less lived up to these hopes. His steady administration appears to have been effective during a tempestuous era on the Court. As a justice, however, he was less impressive. Vinson was rumored to have given the bulk of his opinion writing to his clerks. Moreover, his pragmatism showed no great philosophic appreciation of CONSTITUTIONAL LAW. He gener- ally voted conservatively except when support- ing decisions that upheld the discrimination claims of African Americans. On racial SEGREGA- TION , he wrote that states practicing the SEPARATE BUT EQUAL doctrine must provide facilities that were truly equal (Sweatt v. Painter and McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents). This valuable support for civil rights would be taken further by his successor, EARL WARREN. At the same time, Vinson’s anti-Communism fanned the flames of the COLD WAR.InDennis v. United States, 341 U.S. 494, 71 S. Ct. 857, 95 L. Ed. 1137 (1951), he upheld the convictions of American Communist party leaders. Vinson’s eagerness to bolster federal power can be seen in his most famous opinion, a DISSENT in YOUNGSTOWN SHEET AND TUBE CO. V. SAWYER, 343 U.S. 579, 72 S. Ct. 863, 96 L. Ed. 1153 (1952). During the KOREAN WAR, Truman temporarily seized control of most of the nation’s steel mills in order to supply the military. The White House asserted that the seizure was necessary to prevent a national catastrophe, but the steel industry argued that the seizure was tantamount to lawmaking—a power held only by Congress. Although the majority in Youngstown Sheet held that the executive decision was unconstitutional, Vinson Frederick M. Vinson. PHOTOGRAPH BY HAR- RIS & EWING. COLLEC- TION OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. Frederick Moore Vinson 1890–1953 ▼▼ ▼▼ 18751875 19501950 19251925 19001900 ❖ 1890 Born, Louisa, Ky. ◆ 1898 Spanish-American War ◆ 1911 Admitted to Kentucky bar ◆ 1913 Served as Louisville city attorney 1914–18 World War I 1923–29 Served in U.S. House ◆ 1929 Stock market crashed; Great Depression began 1931–37 Served in U.S. House 1939–45 World War II 1937–43 Served as judge on U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for D.C. 1943–45 Served as director, Office of Economic Stabilization ❖ 1953 Died, Washington, D.C. 1950–53 Korean War ◆◆ 1945 Appointed secretary of the Treasury 1946 Appointed chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court by President Truman ◆ 1942 Served as chief justice, Emergency Court of Appeals FREEDOM FROM DISCRIMINATION BY THE STATES IN THE ENJOYMENT OF PROPERTY RIGHTS WAS AMONG THE BASIC OBJECTIVES SOUGHT TO BE EFFECTUATED BY THE FRAMERS OF THE FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT. —FREDERICK VINSON GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION VINSON, FREDERICK MOORE 247 . of the American legal system rests on the RULE OF LAW, a concept GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION 244 VIGILANTISM embodied in the notion that the United States is a nation of laws. U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. He became chief justice of the U.S. Emergency Court of Appeals in 1942 and the following year GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION 246. has done GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION VIGILANTISM 245 them wrong. In each case, vigilantes take it upon themselves to enact justice, rather than enlist police officers, lawyers,