Protest May Test State’s Funeral Law
TAMPA - A two-week-old Florida law prohibiting protesters from disrupting military funerals might get its first test today. Members of Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan., said they have organized a protest outside the funeral of Staff Sgt. Joseph Fuerst III this morning at Christ the King Catholic Church. Fuerst, a 1998 graduate of Plant High School, was killed during an attack in the Panjway district of Afghanistan. Westboro has made news and enemies nationwide for its views that God is killing U.S. soldiers to punish America for its tolerance of homosexuality. Florida’s military-funerals law, which took effect June 20, carries a penalty of up to a year in prison.
Yeah, I’m tired of former DUMB@$$ AWARD wiener Fred Phelps getting miles of column inches for being a completely devoid of normal human decency, cruel and heartless “Christian” trollmeister. I’m tired of him trampling on the rights and sensibilities of grieving families, simply because he feels that his hate-fueled bigotry trumps anyone else’s beliefs and sensibilities.
If Fred Phelps is a Christian, then I’m the Queen of England….
Thankfully, Phelps and his travelling band of troglodytes from Topeka’s Westboro Baptist Church have sparked something of a backlash. That’s a good thing, but here’s the problem with passing legislation against protests at military funerals: are laws designed to proscribe this sort of objetctionable behavior going to pass constitutional muster? Given that protests are generally considered to be a form of protected speech, Phelps and his inbreds have the right to express their views- reprehensible though they may be. Free speech is often highly objectionable and offensive speech…and it doesn’t get much more objectionable and offensive than this.
As much as I hate to be percieved as coming down on the side of Fred Phelps, I do have some very real concerns about Florida’s new law. While I understand and applaud the thinking behind it (who DOESN’T want to shut Phelps and his travelling band of knuckleheads up?), this is still a free speech issue, and when you begin legislating against certain forms of speech, you’re heading down a sliippery slope. If you’ll allow me to play devil’s advocate for a moment, when you ban Phelp’s gaggle of inbred, knuckle-dragging troglodytes from staging their protest, how long before other forms of protests are banned? It may seem silly, but it’s really not. How long before protests against Gov. Jeb Bush are banned? How long before Liberals are banned from protesting visits from Our Glorious and Benevolent Leader? No, these things probably won’t happen, but if you accept banning protests at military funerals, it’s a very short step to proscribing other sorts of free speech. In this day and age of post-9.11 paranoia, this scenario is closer than you might think.
The state law is a companion to a federal law, passed in May, that makes it illegal to protest within 300 feet of a military cemetery, within 150 feet of a road that leads in or out of the cemetery or within earshot of a service.
After Fuerst’s funeral at Christ the King, on Dale Mabry Highway, he will be buried at Florida National Cemetery in Bushnell, a military cemetery.
As objectionable and disgusting as these protests may be (and they certainly are), I’m not certainly that the solution lies in legislation. One solution is something that has already worked at several military funerals around the country. Simply line up a group of motorcyclists, and when the assholes go into their shtick, they rev their throttles until the noises drowns them out. Some folks have also organized posses to position themselves between the funeral cortege and the assholes, holding up signs to block any objectionable signs. These and other creative solutions are acceptable simply because they are another form of protected speech, and can be defended as a counterprotest.
I believe it would be only a matter of time before the ACLU got involved, portraying the issue as one of simple free speech. As disgusted as I am by Fred Phelps and everything he stands for, I would have to come down on the side of the ACLU on this one. This IS a free speech issue, and I don’t believe that Florida’s law will pass constitutional muster. Of course, I’m not a lawyer, so I may well be wrong on this legal opinion, but I don’t believe that’s the case.
Fred Phelps and his merry assemblage of asswipes have a Constitutional right to voice their opinions- offensive and objectionable though they may be. Of course, good and decent people who happen to be revolted by Phelps’ tactics have every right to do anything within the law to counter any- and everything these knuckle-dragging troglodytes do. This is as it should be. We should be wary of legislating against free speech, though. While no one in their right mind would defend the tactics of Phelps and his inbred, pea-brained followers, if we ban their form of free speech, how long before ours is banned?
