What does the First Amendment say about speech and press?

The First Amendment provides that "Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press." These two clauses are distinct from the Amendment's religion clauses (Establishment and Free Exercise) and protect a different set of activities: speaking, writing, publishing, and — as the Supreme Court has extended it — expressive conduct like flag burning or wearing armbands in protest. Neither protection is absolute. The Court has recognized categories of speech that receive little or no protection, including incitement to imminent lawless action (Brandenburg v. Ohio, 1969, which replaced the older "clear and present danger" standard with a stricter test requiring both intent and likelihood of imminent violence), true threats, and obscenity. Content-based restrictions on protected speech face "strict scrutiny," the most demanding level of judicial review, while content-neutral time, place, and manner restrictions face a lower bar. The Free Press Clause protects the press specifically; Justice Potter Stewart argued in a concurrence that its separate listing alongside speech is "no constitutional accident," reflecting the press's structural role in checking government power, though the Court has generally declined to give the press greater substantive protection than ordinary citizens. Gitlow v. New York (1925) was the landmark case establishing that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment incorporates the Free Speech Clause against the states, meaning state and local governments, not just Congress, are bound by it. Together these two clauses form the core of what is often called the "marketplace of ideas" — the premise, associated with Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, that truth is best tested through open, even offensive, public debate rather than government suppression.