[sellyme]

> How is it unrelated? A noxious branch is exactly something that many or most people would consider abhorrent and perceive as not in good faith.

Because that quote fundamentally discusses cases where pruning said noxious branch is a risk to non-noxious branches.

Sometimes you can just prune a noxious branch and that's that.

[programmarchy]

It sounds like you’re misreading the quote. He is not saying noxious branches should be pruned to protect non-noxious ones. He’s saying do not prune them, instead let them fight it out and see which one bears the best fruit.

This quote is from the The Report of 1800 [1], where he goes on to say:

> Had “Sedition acts,” forbidding every publication that might bring the constituted agents into contempt or disrepute, or that might excite the hatred of the people against the authors of unjust or pernicious measures, been uniformly enforced against the press; might not the United States have been languishing at this day, under the infirmities of a sickly confederation? Might they not possibly be miserable colonies, groaning under a foreign yoke?

He’s crediting the formation of the United States to speech that was “noxious” to either the British parliament or the Confederate states in power at the time. This noxious speech was absolutely a risk to the extent that sedition acts were being threatened. He’s advocating freedom of the press even when their speech may excite hatred.

[1] https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-17-02-020...