February 22, 2006:
Oppose Protest Ban
Dear Friends -
Two bills are pending in the Tennessee General Assembly which would restrict
"picketing, protesting, or demonstrating" near funerals, funeral homes,
memorial services, burials, or funeral processions. Specifically:
SB2660 (Black)/ HB2627 (Hargett) would ban picketing, protesting or
demonstrating with 500 feet of a funeral.
SB2731 (Kurita)/ HB2625 (McMillan) would ban picketing, protesting or
demonstrating within 1,000 feet of a funeral.
These bills are overbroad bans on free speech and would ban every kind of
protest activity.
(See Talking Points below)
BACKGROUND: These bills are in response to the protest activities of
Reverend Fred Phelps from the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas. As
you may know, Rev. Phelps has a long history of hateful protest,
particularly around the funerals of gay men and lesbians. Rev. Phelps
believes that events such as September 11 and the deaths of American
soldiers in Iraq are punishment for America's evils. To that end, Rev.
Phelps and his parishioners have been traveling across the country to
protest outside the funerals of fallen soldiers. Several of these protests
have already taken place in Tennessee.
WHAT TO DO: Please contact your state senator and state representative,
especially if he/she sits on House or Senate Judiciary Committee, before
next week and urge him/her to vote against these bills. The easiest way to
identify your
legislators is to go to www.congress.org and simply type in your zip code
and click "Go," and you will get a list of all your elected officials. (You
may have to type in your street address if your zip code is split between
more than one district.)
TALKING POINTS:
* These bills ban every kind of protest activity and determine that such
activity is considered offensive to “the sensibilities of an ordinary
person.”
* Specifically, the bills ban any “picketing, protesting, or demonstrating.”
The term “picket” has been broadly defined to mean any effort “to persuade
or otherwise influence.” Hill v. Colorado, 530 U.S. 703, 721-22 (2000)
(quoting Webster’s Third New International Dictionary).
* The ban could apply to such unintrusive protest activities such as a
silent vigil, distributing leaflets, or a single person standing in one
place with a sign. Such bans could prohibit a labor picket regarding a
cemetery’s employment practices or a silent vigil protesting the death of
U.S. soldiers in Iraq or a protest against police brutality at the funeral
of a person who died while in police custody.
* The create no-speech zones. These super-sized buffer zones are far larger
than any zone upheld by the Supreme Court that served a similar governmental
purpose. Hill, 530 U.S. 703 (upholding an eight foot buffer zone around
people entering a health care facility). In many cases, the immense
no-speech zones created by these bills will include public parks and plazas
in the vicinity of cemeteries, funeral homes, and churches. Yet all of the
public parks, streets, and sidewalks swept within the bills are traditional
public forums, “held in trust for the use of the public and...used for
purposes of assembly, communicating thoughts between citizens, and
discussing public questions. Hague v. CIO, 307 U.S. 496, 515 (1939)
* These bills are not needed to protect funerals. State and local laws
prohibit trespassing on private property, blocking access to the public way,
making threats, making excessive noise, and uttering fighting words.
* These bills unfairly ban counter-speech. Some funerals include political
speech. For example, at the recent funeral of Coretta Scott King, some
speakers criticized the policies of the Republican Party. It would have been
unfair to ban a Republican from holding a sign near the funeral stating:
“Republicans admire Coretta Scott King too.”
Many thanks!
