Fred Phelps wins

[alnorth]

The Supreme Court has just ruled in an 8-1 decision that if you protest at a funeral, you are immune to lawsuits from the family for inflicting emotional distress.

"Speech is powerful. It can stir people to action, move them to tears of both joy and sorrow, and -- as it did here -- inflict great pain. On the facts before us, we cannot react to that pain by punishing the speaker,"

The Chief Justice wrote the opinion. The dissent was written by Alito.

From Alito's lone dissent:

"Our profound national commitment to free and open debate is not a license for the vicious verbal assault that occurred in this case,"

No one disputed that you have a right to protest at a funeral (ie, you cant be thrown into jail or barred by the government), the question was whether you could be sued if your protest emotionally damages your target at a funeral.

The $5 million judgment against the Phelps clan has been thrown out, and now the father of the dead marine who originally sued has to pay the Phelps' legal bills.

edit: oh, also for the legal nerds out there, that windbag justice Breyer apparently wasn't satisfied with simply signing onto the majority opinion, he wrote his own concurring opinion.

[BigMeatballDave]

A funeral family member is going to have take matters into their own hands.

[BigMeatballDave]

If someone flips out and kills a few of these nutjobs, the nation would cheer and I bet it would be tough to prosecute.

[Deberg_1990]

I wonder if anyone has ever shown up at a Phelps family funeral to protest?

[BigMeatballDave]

Originally Posted by Deberg_1990

I wonder if anyone has ever shown up at a Phelps family funeral to protest?

You KNOW someone will when one occurs. Karma's a ****ing bitch.

[BucEyedPea]

The decision is right. I think there should be a donation drive for the dead Marine's dad even if his lawyers mislead him. There's always a lawyer trying to make a buck.

[InChiefsHeaven]

The KKK is allowed to march. People are allowed to protest abortion clinics, some carrying signs that are truly sickening (I'm pro-life, by the way), people are allowed to gather and have caricatures of the president of the US looking like Hitler or a monkey...these things all serve to rile people up and are certainly hateful and hurtful...the law cannot see a difference here. Are Phelp's people sick and disgusting? Yes. But in America, you don't have the right not to be offended.

In Omaha recently, they were here to protest my niece's Catholic school...but the city would not give them a permit inside of quite a few blocks of the school, so it was basically ineffective. I think cities probably do whatever they can to keep these bastards as far away as possible, but in the end, the have a constitutional right to be assholes. Best thing to do is ignore them.

...but if I was a family member, I'm absolutely positive that I'd want to do...something...about it. Basically, they are exploiting an unintended consequence to free speech. There's always some asshole who tries to screw it up for everyone else...

[dirk digler]

Emotionally I totally disagree with this but I believe it probably was the right one.

I am disappointed though that the court didn't throw out the lower court's ruling on compensating the Phelp's attorney fees. That is the least they could have done. This wasn't a frivolous lawsuit by any means.

[Bowser]

Originally Posted by beach tribe

Anyone heard anything else about An#n's war against them?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/digitaltrend...vconfrontation

[Frazod]

Originally Posted by InChiefsHell

The KKK is allowed to march. People are allowed to protest abortion clinics, some carrying signs that are truly sickening (I'm pro-life, by the way), people are allowed to gather and have caricatures of the president of the US looking like Hitler or a monkey...these things all serve to rile people up and are certainly hateful and hurtful...the law cannot see a difference here. Are Phelp's people sick and disgusting? Yes. But in America, you don't have the right not to be offended.

In Omaha recently, they were here to protest my niece's Catholic school...but the city would not give them a permit inside of quite a few blocks of the school, so it was basically ineffective. I think cities probably do whatever they can to keep these bastards as far away as possible, but in the end, the have a constitutional right to be assholes. Best thing to do is ignore them.

...but if I was a family member, I'm absolutely positive that I'd want to do...something...about it. Basically, they are exploiting an unintended consequence to free speech. There's always some asshole who tries to screw it up for everyone else...

There's a time and a place for everything. I don't agree with anything extremist anti-abortion lunatics do, but if they're going to protest with their giant bloody dead fetus signs, I guess the sidewalk in front of an abortion clinic is the right place to do it. But when they do it on a summer day in the middle of the Chicago Loop, I have a great big goddamn problem with it. Seriously - beautiful summer day, thousands of people walking by, including families with children - why the **** should they be subjected to this shit? What percentage of the people walking past are pregnant women contemplating abortion - I doubt if it's even 1%.

People protesting shit at the expense of those who have NOTHING TO DO WITH WHAT THEY'RE PROTESTING suck. Whether it's the Phelps assholes at the funeral of a fallen soldier, or these dead fetus sign sporting ****s in Chicago, or a bunch of wheelchair assholes protesting lack of handicapped access by blocking the food court of an ADA compliant building (another personal favorite).

Seriously, **** these people.

[siberian khatru]

Originally Posted by Deberg_1990

I wonder if anyone has ever shown up at a Phelps family funeral to protest?

We should create one and find out.

[ReynardMuldrake]

Originally Posted by Chiefnj2

What damage would there be to enact a law that says "no public demonstration aimed at a funeral within 1 square mile of the funeral home and/or cemetery"?

That's not what the court was ruling on.

[jAZ]

There is a lot of speech that I hate. These protests being one of them. But banning it is ridiculous. Allowing protesters to be sued for emotional distress is ridiculous. Since campaign spending is "speech" too, then maybe I can sue the Koch Brothers for emotional distress.

[Mr. Laz]

dam courts are so intent on justice being blind that they don't use common sense.

[Bambi]

Originally Posted by jAZ

There is a lot of speech that I hate. These protests being one of them. But banning it is ridiculous. Allowing protesters to be sued for emotional distress is ridiculous. Since campaign spending is "speech" too, then maybe I can sue the Koch Brothers for emotional distress.

Yeah I'm not sure what the uproar is here.

Obviously the Supreme Court was going to rule this way. Sure most of them are pretty right leaning nowadays but they still maintain the "common sense" of free speech.

[alnorth]

From Alito's lone dissent:

"Our profound national commitment to free and open debate is not a license for the vicious verbal assault that occurred in this case,"