Gay, SCOTUS

Westboro Whack Jobs Will Get Their Day in Front of SCOTUS

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I love it when America takes popular beliefs about the liberal and conservative agenda, throws those platforms on their heads, and then leaves it up to the Supreme Court to makes sense of the resulting mess.
This fall, SCOTUS will try to restore a sense of order to our national infighting when it tackles Snyder v. Phelps. The case revolves around anti-gay protesters who have been showing up at military funerals to cheer the deaths of American soldiers who “defend homosexuality.”
That’s right, because when I think of a flamboyant institution that is the tool of the gay agenda, I naturally think of the Marines. The Huffington Post explains:

The funeral for Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder in Westminster, Md., was among many that have been picketed by members of the fundamentalist Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas. Westboro pastor Fred Phelps and other members have used the funeral protests to spread their belief that U.S. deaths in the Iraq war are punishment for the nation’s tolerance of homosexuality. One of the signs at Snyder’s funeral combined the U.S. Marine Corps motto with a slur against gay men.
Other signs carred by members of the Topeka, Kan.-based church said, “America is Doomed,” “God Hates the USA/Thank God for 9/11,” “Priests Rape Boys” and “Thank God for IEDs,” a reference to the roadside bombs that have killed many U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

So, if I’m a liberal that loves the First amendment and gays, what am I supposed to do? If I’m a conservative who loves the military but thinks that the missionary position is God’s will, whom do I punish? Oh dear, it’s so confusing.
Thankfully, we have a body of nine people who are not swayed by such base political leanings, right?


SCOTUSblog explains the procedural history that brought this case to the high court:

The funeral picketing case (Snyder v. Phelps, et al., 09-751) focuses on a significant question of First Amendment law: the degree of constitutional protection given to private remarks made about a private person, occurring in a largely private setting. The family of the dead soldier had won a verdict before a jury, but that was overturned by the Fourth Circuit Court, finding that the signs displayed at the funeral in western Maryland and later comments on an anti-gay website were protected speech. The petition for review seeks the Court’s protection for families attending a funeral from “unwanted” remarks or displays by protesters.

Wow, take a look at SCOTUS wading into a hot-button issue about gays. I wonder if the Court will be as willing to grant cert when gay marriage is ripe for judicial consideration?
Still, doesn’t this case have 9-0 written all over it? We’re in for either “free speech means protecting that which I would spend a life opposing,” or it’s a whole bottle of “keep your big mouth OUT of private affairs.”
It just makes “the law” so much nicer when hot-button issues don’t break down along party lines — especially when the party lines are kind of blurred.
Westboro Church Protests Head To Supreme Court [Huffington Post]
Court to rule on funeral pickets [SCOTUSblog]

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