by Nathaniel R. Helms | January 20, 2011 | Previous story: Westboro Comes to St Charles | Next story: Westboro Prevails: Law Cannot Be Enforced

As expected the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit in United States District Court in St. Louis, Missouri Wednesday on behalf of two members of the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kansas and against the nearby City of St. Charles for passing a law that prevents members of the congregation from disrupting military funerals.

City officials of the St. Louis suburb are trying to find a legal remedy that will provide relief from the anti-gay religious group’s penchant for exercising its Constitutional right to free speech by heckling mourners at military funerals.

On Tuesday a similar county ordinance covering funerals in unincorporated areas was the subject of a two-hour federal court hearing before U.S. District Judge Audrey Fleissig. The judge is expected to issue a ruling on church members' request for a preliminary injunction against the measure before it is set to go into effect Feb. 7, according to a court clerk. The county law was passed last November after church protestors disrupted several military funerals in the area.

St Charles is a suburb of St. Louis best known as the launching place for the Lewis & Clark Expedition until Tuesday night when the city council unanimously passed an ordinance prohibiting protesters from approaching within 300 feet of a funeral site. It is patterned after the  St. Charles County ordinance.

In 2006 Missouri adopted a state-wide law banning protests at funerals. It was ruled unconstitutional by U.S. District Judge Fernando Gaitan at the state capital in Jefferson City. Yesterday law makers at the Capital vowed to introduce a new law that is more sensitive to the rights of the religious gay bashers while still protecting mourners from their excesses.

The normally quiet community of St. Charles has been up in arms since members of the Westboro Baptist Church began showing up at military funerals locally to protest homosexuality in the military.  Using their placard-carrying children for sign boards, congregation members gather near grave sites during the solemn occasions to chant provocative religious dogma. Twice in January church members have also shown up in St. Charles to protest the threatened ban on their activities.

Last week the Westboro Baptist Church announced its members would picket in the tiny Missouri Ozark community of Seymour where Missouri Army National Guard Sergeant First Class Robert Pharris was being laid to rest. Pharris was killed in Afghanistan January 5th when insurgents attacked his agricultural development team in Nangarhar Province.  The 48-year old Guardsman died from wounds he sustained from an IED, Pentagon officials reported

Church members led by 82-year old Rev. Fred Phelps claim God is allowing American service members to be maimed and killed because the United States military tolerates gay men and lesbians in its ranks.

In response to Westboro’s threatened intrusion local veterans and civic leaders in Seymore mounted 'Operation Human Shield' to protect Pharris’ family from the religious group’s intrusive presence. The plan was for 4,000 invited guests to create a barrier of humanity between the grief stricken family and the Westboro protestors. The Webster County sheriff even blocked off a section of road in front of the Seymour Church of the Nazarene and had about twenty deputies and a number of officers from neighboring forces there for back up, local reports said. After all that the folks from Westboro never showed up, although more than 3,000 mourners did.

Both Missouri laws currently under federal court scrutiny are patterned after a Nebraska statute that has already withstood one court challenge, although the federal case is still pending. In June Nebraska U.S. District Judge Laurie Smith Camp denied an ACLU motion for a preliminary injunction against the statute, arguing family members at a funeral are "a captive audience” whom are “particularly vulnerable” to such outrages. The struck down Missouri state law was aimed at protecting everyone attending the funeral.

The more recent St. Charles County measure, which applies only to unincorporated areas, and the new city ordinance, applicable only within the city limits of St Charles, were written to balance the right of family and friends to mourn and pickets to exercise free speech rights,  county and city officials said. Both laws prohibit picketing within 300 feet of a funeral or burial site between an hour before and an hour after the observance.

The ACLU and the Topeka-based church contend that the measures are unconstitutional because they limit “free speech.” Church members say military deaths are part of divine judgment for what they regard as the nation's tolerance of gays.

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Nathaniel R. Helms
Defend Our Marines
20 January 2011

Note: Nat Helms is a Contributing Editor to Defend Our Marines. He is a Vietnam veteran, former police officer, war correspondent, and, most recently, author of My Men Are My Heroes: The Brad Kasal Story (Meredith Books, 2007).