Fred Phelps and his obnoxious kids won another one.
Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, 8-1, that they and their phony church had the right to picket military funerals, wave signs saying “Thank God for 9/11,” “God Hates Fags,” “Thank God for Dead Soldiers,” while tromping on the U.S. flag and taking other outrageous actions designed to call attention to their message, which is that military deaths are God’s punishment for the tolerance of homosexuality.
Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the opinion for the court.
“What Westboro (the name of the ‘church’) said, in the whole context of how and where it chose to say it, is entitled to special protection under the First Amendment,” Roberts wrote, “and that protection cannot be overcome by a jury finding that the picketing was outrageous.”
The picketing was indeed outrageous. The Phelpses staged their obscene display around a Maryland church where Matthew Snyder was to be buried. Snyder was a Marine who died in Iraq in 2006. Following the funeral his father, Albert Snyder, sued the church for intentionally causing him emotional distress. He won an $11 million judgment which later was reduced to $5 million.
The Phelpses appealed and the case was tossed out by an appeals court on First Amendment grounds.
Snyder appealed. The case then was accepted by the Supreme Court leading to Tuesday’s decision.
The 8-1 decision is appalling because it seems to justify Phelps and his litter; but it was a sound decision because it protected political speech.
Forget the Phelpses’ sick obsession with homosexuality. The key thing is that their protests are aimed at the political decisions to go to war and take other actions which provoke attacks on the nation or its soldiers. Their demonstrations single out the military and the government which directs it. They aim directly at the actions of the executive and Congress. By showing disrespect for the U.S. flag, they attack all of the elements of the United States and its people.
The primary purpose of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is to allow critics to publicly protest against the policies and actions of government without fear of punishment — including punishment inflicted through the courts.
THE FIRST AMENDMENT not only shields the Phelpses. It also allows politicians to say that the health care reform bill sets up death panels to decide when granny will die without fear of being tossed in the brig. It allows a congressman to stand up in the middle of a president’s speech and call him a liar. It allows partisans of every stripe to make all manner of misstatements and outright fabrications without fear of persecution.
But primarily, the First Amendment is the shield between the citizen determined to stand up in the public square and shout, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore,” and a government official who would silence him.
It is, in short, the very bedrock — the categorical imperative — of our democracy.
That’s the inconvenient truth of Tuesday’s decision.
— Emerson Lynn, jr.
