Is the the phrase clear and present danger in the US Constitution?

Answer 1

No. "Clear and present danger" is a test derived from Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr's opinion in the Supreme Court case Schenck v. US, (1919), that first set legal restrictions on the exercise of First Amendment free speech, depending on the content and context of the speech. "Clear and present danger," refers to judging whether a particular use of free speech created an obvious dangerous danger to people or the government, and therefore was not protect speech but could be punished by the courts or censored.

Case Citation:

Schenck v. United States, 249 US 47 (1919)

Answer 2

It doesn't, at least not textually. But in U.S. law, the various Supreme Court of the United States decisions also and more explicatively form the body of American Constitutional Law. It goes far beyond the 4,600 textual words.

"The question in every case," wrote Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes for the Court in Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47 (1919), "is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent."

Schenk has been seen to have at least partly been overruled by Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 (1969).