On April 4, 1918 Senator Overman urged his colleagues in the United States Senate to approve the Sedition Act of 1918 within two days. The paper outlines the context of the proposal, and argues that it involved a fallacy. An analysis of the fallacy is offered, and it is argued that in the study of political discourse it is often helpful to take the inner convictions of speakers into account.

A type of ad socordiam is identified in its context, with data from debates on the Bill of Rights in 1789. The fallacy involves a hidden intention as a salient feature. The study examines the ques-tion of how inferences can be made about hidden intentions. Further, it examines the relation of the fallacy identified to another type of ad socordiam.