Around 20,000 people gathered to watch the execution, the largest crowd for a hanging in early American history.

The crime? Sedition. Thomas Hickey, a member of George Washington’s personal guard, was part of a conspiracy of British loyalists aiming to kill the future president. He was hanged days before the Founding Fathers declared independence from King George III.

Around 250 years later, President Donald Trump is invoking the term against Democrats who made a video urging servicemembers to resist illegal orders. The president on Nov. 20 accused the six Democratic Congress members of "seditious behavior, punishable by death."

However, U.S. law has evolved significantly since the American Revolution and Hickey’s execution in a field that would become Manhattan’s Chinatown. Legal experts told USA TODAY that the president’s accusations would likely fall apart in court. And, according to legal statute, sedition is punishable by a fine and up to 20 years in prison, not death.

"His post is incorrect top to bottom, and only serves to inflame an already dangerous environment," Steve Schwinn, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Illinois Chicago School of Law, said of the president’s post on social media. "What they’re saying is not even close to sedition."

Democrats urging troops to "refuse illegal orders" amid Trump’s efforts to deploy soldiers to cities said nothing seditious, several experts told USA TODAY.

"The speech Trump is criticizing simply states the law: soldiers are not to follow unconstitutional or illegal orders," said Erwin Chemerinsky, the dean of UC Berkeley Law. "The accusation is unfounded and unnecessarily chills criticism of the President’s actions."

Asked at a Nov. 20 news conference if Trump wants to execute members of Congress, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, "No."

Justice Department spokesperson Natalie Baldassarre declined to comment on whether the agency would investigate the lawmakers in response to the president’s comment.

Sedition in American history

Title 18 of U.S. Code Section 2384, labeled "seditious conspiracy," defines sedition as conspiracies to "overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States . . . or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States."

Prosecutors have rarely brought people up on sedition charges, according to legal scholars. But the statute saw some use around World War I amid fears of anarchists and in the 1950s against Puerto Rican nationalists.

Anarchists were indicted on sedition charges for procuring weapons, distributing anti-war propaganda and encouraging people to resist obligatory military service.

In 1954, 17 Puerto Rican nationalists were convicted or pleaded guilty to sedition charges. The group engaged in a three-year plot to secure independence for the island that culminated in a shooting at the U.S. Capitol.

A prominent modern example of sedition, according to Schwinn, came during the Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021. Former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years in prison for seditious conspiracy after organizing the effort to thwart the certification of the 2020 presidential election.

Trump approved pardons for nearly 1,600 people charged in the riot, including Tarrio who had received the longest sentence in connection with the riot.

Trump, supporters respond: 'HANG THEM'

Sedition in U.S. law is not punishable by death. But that hasn't stopped a number of his supporters to call for the death penalty.

"Each one of these traitors to our Country should be ARRESTED AND PUT ON TRIAL," the president wrote in a post in his social media platform Truth Social, adding later: "SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!"

The video that tells troops to resist illegal orders comes amid Trump’s efforts to deploy soldiers to cities around the country to quell what he calls unrest and rampant crime. Trump has said some Democrat-controlled cities are not enforcing the law and that rebellions are underway.

The president also shared the words of supporters who lambasted the Democrats.

Among the posts that Trump "reTruthed" were angry posts calling the lawmakers "traitors" and "domestic terrorist Democrats" and another reading, "HANG THEM GEORGE WASHINGTON WOULD !!"

In a Nov. 20 speech on the Senate floor, Chuck Schumer, the Senate minority leader, said Trump's posts should be taken as an "outright threat."

"Let's be crystal clear – the president of the United States is calling for the execution of elected officials. This is an outright threat, and it's deadly serious," he said.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Punishable by death': Trump decries Dems as seditionists. What does he mean?

Reporting by Michael Loria, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect