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Supreme Court rules against abortion clinics, protests cannot be
banned using extortion laws
msnbc ^ | Tues., Feb. 28, 2006
Posted on 12/09/2007 1:12:11 PM PST by Coleus
A 20-year-old legal fight over protests outside abortion clinics ended
Tuesday with the Supreme Court ruling that federal extortion and
racketeering laws cannot be used against demonstrators. The 8-0
decision was a setback for abortion clinics that were buoyed when the
7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals kept their case alive two years ago
despite the high court's 2003 ruling that had cleared the way for
lifting a nationwide injunction on anti-abortion leader Joseph
Scheidler and others.
Anti-abortion groups appealed to the justices after the lower court
sought to determine whether the injunction could be supported by
findings that protesters had made threats of violence. In Tuesday's
ruling, Justice Stephen Breyer said Congress did not create "a
freestanding physical violence offense" in the federal extortion law
known as the Hobbs Act.
'A great day for pro-lifers'
Instead, Breyer wrote, Congress addressed violence outside abortion
clinics in 1994 by passing the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances
Act, which allows for court injunctions to set limits for such
protests. "It's a great day for pro-lifers," said Troy Newman,
president of Operation Rescue. Kim Gandy, president of the National
Organization for Women, said the decision was disappointing because
the injunction had decreased violence outside clinics nationally. She
said the clinic access act is problematic because it requires abortion
providers to seek injunctions "city by city" and turns back the clock
to the late 1980s when NOW played cat and mouse with Operation Rescue
in trying to anticipate the cities and clinics that abortion
protesters planned to target next.
Newman said his group and others have set their sights on the clinic
access law, filing legal challenges they hope will lead courts --
possibly even the Supreme Court-- to overturn it.
Also Tuesday, the Missouri state Supreme Court upheld the state's 24-
hour waiting period for abortions, rejecting arguments that it was
overly vague and deprived people of liberty and privacy rights.
The law, enacted when legislators overrode a veto of then-Gov. Bob
Holden, requires physicians to wait 24 hours after conferring with
women before performing abortions. It requires that consultation to
cover such things as "the indicators and contraindicators" and the
"physical, psychological and situational" risk factors associated with
abortions.
Abortion opponents hope momentum is shifting in their favor: Last
week, the high court decided to consider reinstating a federal ban on
what opponents call partial-birth abortion, and the South Dakota
legislature's passed a bill that would make it a crime for doctors to
perform an abortion unless it was necessary to save the woman's life.
President Bush, asked about the South Dakota measure in an interview
with ABC News' Elizabeth Vargas, said Tuesday he hadn't "paid
attention to that, to this particular issue you're talking about" but
"I am not going to prejudge how the Supreme Court is going to judge a
particular issue."
However, he said, "My position has always been three exceptions: rape,
incests and the life of the mother." Asked if he would include the
broader category of health of the mother, Bush said: "No. I said life
of the mother, and health is a very vague term, but my position has
been clear on that ever since I started running for office."
In the abortion protest case, social activists and the AFL-CIO had
sided with the demonstrators out of concern that the federal extortion
law could be used to thwart their efforts to change public policy or
agitate for better wages and working conditions.
Twenty years of legal battles
The legal battle began in 1986, when NOW filed a class-action suit
challenging tactics used by the Pro-Life Action Network to block women
from entering abortion clinics.
NOW's legal strategy was novel at the time, relying on civil
provisions of the 1970 Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations
Act, which was used predominantly in criminal cases against organized
crime. The lawsuit also relied on the Hobbs Act, a 55-year-old law
banning extortion.
A federal judge issued a nationwide injunction against the anti-
abortion protesters after a Chicago jury found in 1998 that
demonstrators had engaged in a pattern of racketeering by interfering
with clinic operations, menacing doctors, assaulting patients and
damaging clinic property.
But the Supreme Court ruled in 2003 that the extortion law could not
be used against the protesters because they had not illegally
"obtained property" from women seeking to enter clinics to receive
abortions.
Justice Samuel Alito did not participate in the decision because he
was not a member of the court when the case was argued.
The cases are Scheidler v. NOW, 04-1244, and Operation Rescue v. NOW,
04-1352.
Supreme Court rules against abortion clinics, protests cannot be
banned using extortion laws
msnbc ^ | Tues., Feb. 28, 2006
Posted on 12/09/2007 1:12:11 PM PST by Coleus
A 20-year-old legal fight over protests outside abortion clinics ended
Tuesday with the Supreme Court ruling that federal extortion and
racketeering laws cannot be used against demonstrators. The 8-0
decision was a setback for abortion clinics that were buoyed when the
7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals kept their case alive two years ago
despite the high court's 2003 ruling that had cleared the way for
lifting a nationwide injunction on anti-abortion leader Joseph
Scheidler and others.
Anti-abortion groups appealed to the justices after the lower court
sought to determine whether the injunction could be supported by
findings that protesters had made threats of violence. In Tuesday's
ruling, Justice Stephen Breyer said Congress did not create "a
freestanding physical violence offense" in the federal extortion law
known as the Hobbs Act.
'A great day for pro-lifers'
Instead, Breyer wrote, Congress addressed violence outside abortion
clinics in 1994 by passing the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances
Act, which allows for court injunctions to set limits for such
protests. "It's a great day for pro-lifers," said Troy Newman,
president of Operation Rescue. Kim Gandy, president of the National
Organization for Women, said the decision was disappointing because
the injunction had decreased violence outside clinics nationally. She
said the clinic access act is problematic because it requires abortion
providers to seek injunctions "city by city" and turns back the clock
to the late 1980s when NOW played cat and mouse with Operation Rescue
in trying to anticipate the cities and clinics that abortion
protesters planned to target next.
Newman said his group and others have set their sights on the clinic
access law, filing legal challenges they hope will lead courts --
possibly even the Supreme Court-- to overturn it.
Also Tuesday, the Missouri state Supreme Court upheld the state's 24-
hour waiting period for abortions, rejecting arguments that it was
overly vague and deprived people of liberty and privacy rights.
The law, enacted when legislators overrode a veto of then-Gov. Bob
Holden, requires physicians to wait 24 hours after conferring with
women before performing abortions. It requires that consultation to
cover such things as "the indicators and contraindicators" and the
"physical, psychological and situational" risk factors associated with
abortions.
Abortion opponents hope momentum is shifting in their favor: Last
week, the high court decided to consider reinstating a federal ban on
what opponents call partial-birth abortion, and the South Dakota
legislature's passed a bill that would make it a crime for doctors to
perform an abortion unless it was necessary to save the woman's life.
President Bush, asked about the South Dakota measure in an interview
with ABC News' Elizabeth Vargas, said Tuesday he hadn't "paid
attention to that, to this particular issue you're talking about" but
"I am not going to prejudge how the Supreme Court is going to judge a
particular issue."
However, he said, "My position has always been three exceptions: rape,
incests and the life of the mother." Asked if he would include the
broader category of health of the mother, Bush said: "No. I said life
of the mother, and health is a very vague term, but my position has
been clear on that ever since I started running for office."
In the abortion protest case, social activists and the AFL-CIO had
sided with the demonstrators out of concern that the federal extortion
law could be used to thwart their efforts to change public policy or
agitate for better wages and working conditions.
Twenty years of legal battles
The legal battle began in 1986, when NOW filed a class-action suit
challenging tactics used by the Pro-Life Action Network to block women
from entering abortion clinics.
NOW's legal strategy was novel at the time, relying on civil
provisions of the 1970 Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations
Act, which was used predominantly in criminal cases against organized
crime. The lawsuit also relied on the Hobbs Act, a 55-year-old law
banning extortion.
A federal judge issued a nationwide injunction against the anti-
abortion protesters after a Chicago jury found in 1998 that
demonstrators had engaged in a pattern of racketeering by interfering
with clinic operations, menacing doctors, assaulting patients and
damaging clinic property.
But the Supreme Court ruled in 2003 that the extortion law could not
be used against the protesters because they had not illegally
"obtained property" from women seeking to enter clinics to receive
abortions.
Justice Samuel Alito did not participate in the decision because he
was not a member of the court when the case was argued.
The cases are Scheidler v. NOW, 04-1244, and Operation Rescue v. NOW,
04-1352.
