An attorney, during law school Schmidt worked as a radio DJ, and upon graduation chose to specialize in communication law. He eventually ended up as the general counsel to the American Society of Newspaper Editors.
In his most important case, he represented the Miami Herald. Florida law required newspapers to print responses from politicians who were criticized by newspapers, a so-called “right of reply.” In a case that wound up in the Supreme Court in 1974, Schmidt argued that the law violated a key element of the First Amendment to the Constitution: freedom of the press. In a unanimous decision the Supreme Court struck down the Florida law, firmly establishing that no branch of government has a right to dictate what a newspaper prints.
He died October 17 at his home in Washington, D.C., from congestive heart failure. He was 80.