Four years after the Yates decision, the Supreme Court reversed the conviction of another second-tier CPUSA leader, John Francis Noto of New York, in the 1961 Noto v. United States case.[154] Noto was convicted under the membership clause of the Smith Act, and he challenged the constitutionality of that clause on appeal.[155] The membership clause was in the portion of the Smith Act that made it a crime "to organize or help to organize any society, group, or assembly of persons who teach, advocate, or encourage the overthrow or destruction of any government in the United States by force or violence; or to be or become a member of, or affiliate with, any such society, group, or assembly of persons, knowing the purposes thereof ...".[3] In a unanimous decision, the court reversed the conviction because the evidence presented at trial was not sufficient to demonstrate that the Party was advocating action (as opposed to mere doctrine) of forcible overthrow of the government.[155] On behalf of the majority, Justice Harlan wrote:[156]