How would you feel if you went to buy some beer or wine for a party and encountered a group of strangers blocking the entrance to a liquor store and shouting about the evils of alcohol and when you tried to walk around or through them, they kept blocking your way, telling you that beer and wine are the work of the devil and they are trying to save you from his clutches? More than likely, you would be inclined to call the police, as risky as that can be these days.
Yet, the US Supreme Court has unanimously ruled, in striking down Massachusetts’ 35-foot buffer zones around abortion clinics, it’s okay to subject women entering an abortion clinic to such harassment in the name of “free speech.”
Never mind that abortions and liquor are legal. Okay, that’s a bad analogy but what compares to the hell the anti-abortion protesters put women through?
However, when it comes to political speech and the First Amendment right of the people to peaceably assemble and petition the government for redress of grievances, the court has upheld herding people into so-called “free speech zone” far from where the people they are trying to reach can see or hear them.
In a 9-0 decision in Wood et al. v. Moss et al., Justice Ruth Ginsberg wrote, “People are not at liberty to speak whenever, however, and wherever they please,” adding, ‘In that regard, we have recognized that securing the safety of the president is a vital concern.”
Earlier this year, this same court ruled that military commanders have the right to remove protesters for cause (however they define “cause”) from designated “free speech zones.”
So when the alleged “safety” of the president, not to mention his/her comfort, is concerned, the only free speech of protesters allowed is where it can’t be seen or heard, and when military commanders decide there is “cause,” they can shut down free speech in designated zones, but the safety and comfort of a woman seeking a legal abortion is of no concern, therefore the anti-abortionists can harass away—cajoling, praying, condemning.
By the way, visitors to the court must “maintain suitable order and decorum within the Supreme Court building and grounds.” Demonstrations defined as “picketing, speech making, marching, holding vigils or religious services and all other like forms of conduct that involve the communication or expression of views or grievances, engaged in by one or more persons, the conduct of which is reasonably likely to draw a crowd or onlookers” are prohibited. So much for free speech, eh?
The anti-abortion madness has gone on for more than 41 years. The anti-abortionists are so pro-life that they jeopardize the health and lives of pregnant women in order to salvage fetuses that they want nothing to do with supporting when they are born if the mothers can’t.
Anti-abortionists have murdered abortion providers, burned and bombed clinics, stood shouting outside the homes of providers, followed providers’ children to school, and gotten restrictive state laws passed to make abortions less accessible and caused clinics to close. Now the Supremes say they have the free speech right of harassing women entering clinics. Massachusetts’ mere 35-foot buffer zone is 35 feet too far.
Bev Conover is the editor and publisher of Intrepid Report. Email her at editor@intrepidreport.com.
All Hail to the Supreme Illuminati—NOT!
Although the “Supreme” Court has no problem with radical environmentalists that damage property but harm no one being prosecuted as terrorists, it is blind to the conspiracies to murder and bomb that have emerged from the “right to life” movement. SCOTUS has morphed into a reactionary load of wet ash dumped on our political processes. It would be useful to recall two facts. First, our Constitution does not give the court the right of judicial review, that has evolved through precedent. Second, our Constitution does not stipulate how many judges comprise the court, something that Franklin Roosevelt knew well. There may be more than one way to skin a SCOTUS and put an end to judicial coups in our presidential elections and decisions like Citizens United.
May I also add that two members, Scalia and Thomas, have serious conflict-of-interest problems and, moreover, inappropriate connections to the ultra-right Opus Dei and might be liable to impeachment.
The Roberts Court will be remembered in history as one that parallels the Dred Scott Court of 1857. Women are to be harassed and brutalized by men and women screaming obscenities at them as they enter a health care facility. Justice Roberts calls this their right to “compassionate conversation”.
When Justice Roberts enters a health care facility for any medical care problem, he is not greeted by protesters disagreeing with his constitutional right to seek medical care. Should that happen, the protester getting in his way would be arrested. And rightly so!
The Roberts Court is protecting a band of “religious” marauders who murder doctors and damage clinics. You will be long remembered for this decision.
I am holding back on public comment about yesterday’s USSC decision that permits anti-health reproductive care for women protesters to get in women’s faces and scream “murderer”.
When Justice Roberts sought medical help for his epileptic seizure, I am very sure there were no Christian Scientists protesting his right to seek medical help. Justice Scalia and Thomas are free to walk into any hospital or clinic for medical help—regardless of cause without threats of “compassionate conversation” about the wisdom of their decision. The public does not know if along with problems of obesity both Scalia and Thomas are pre-diabetic or have prostate problems that some religious nuts object to treating.
At what point will the public grow so disgusted with the Roberts Court that justices will be relieved of their life-time appointments?
We are trying to argue that its okay to have buffer zones for politicians, but not average citizens? Sounds a little backwards to me. There should not be a buffer zone for free speech at all. HENCE THE TERM FREE SPEECH. I am completely against abortion. I don’t stand in front of abortion clinics and protest, because I believe if people want to murder unborn children then that’s their problem. If some people want to protest my going into a liquor store, fine with me. That is their right as a United States citizen. If one segment of the population loses their rights WE ALL LOSE OUR RIGHTS.
There are already sufficient statutes against moral midgets stalking and harassing people seeking health care and birth control but it takes political will to enforce them. I wonder if these self-appointed guardians of other people’s fetuses will finally come to realize the central role their identity politics plays in keeping Americans divided one against the other to perpetuate our kleptocracy. Where were these hypocrites when sanctions against Iraq killed a half million actual children (not fetuses)?