Nonvanishing of a nonprincipal Dirichlet L-function at one

For every nonprincipal Dirichlet character, $L(1,\chi )\ne 0$. A nonreal character is covered by Euler product positivity for L-function nonvanishing at height zero, since its squared character is nonprincipal.

For a real character, suppose $L(1,\chi )=0$. The simple zeta pole would cancel, making $F(s)=\zeta (s)L(s,\chi )$ an entire function. Its nonnegative zeta-times-real-L coefficients satisfy $a_n\ge 0$ and $a_{m^2}\ge 1$. Termwise derivatives at two give $(-1{)}^k{F}^{(k)}(2)={\sum }_n{a}_n(\log n{)}^k{n}^{-2}$. The Taylor series of this entire function at two converges at zero. Every term there is nonnegative, and Tonelli theorem identifies its sum asThe last series diverges because all square coefficients are at least one. This contradiction proves the claim. It is the positive-coefficient mechanism behind the more general Landau theorem for a Dirichlet series with nonnegative coefficients.