First Amendment rights do not apply in Detroit if the speaker comes within several feet of an abortion clinic or a person headed toward one, under a criminal ordinance.Those rights also would not apply near some of the most famous landmarks in New York City due to proximity to abortion clinics and houses of worship, an amped-up New York version of the polarizing federal Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, under sweeping criminal legislation championed by Gov. Kathy Hochul and fellow Democratic lawmakers.
So-called sidewalk counselors are challenging the Motor City’s 2024 ordinance in a federal court that answers to an appellate jurisdiction known for its strong First Amendment precedents, while a civil liberties group is agitating against Empire State legislation it describes as flatly prohibited by a 2014 Supreme Court precedent against abortion clinic “buffer zones.”
The McCullen precedent against Massachusetts has not been used by the justices, yet, to vacate the high court’s 2000 “zombie precedent” Hill, which upheld Colorado’s buffer zone as a constitutionally permissible time, place and manner restriction and has been widely invoked by lower courts to uphold similar buffer zones.
The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals went in the opposite direction last year, citing McCullen to block Clearwater, Fla.’s buffer zone, prompting the Gulf Coast city to permanently suspend its law this month.
The public interest law firm behind the Clearwater challenge and an earlier successful Minneapolis challenge, the Thomas More Society, is also representing Sidewalk Advocates for Life, which says its work has prompted more than 25,000 women to choose “life-affirming alternatives,” and its “certified” advocate Kevin Hammer against Detroit.
“The government cannot wall off the public square so that women never hear they have alternatives to abortion,” Vice President Peter Breen said.
Retired attorney Hammer’s only crime is offering “real support” to women heading into Scotsdale Women’s Center, Breen said, yet the abortion clinic has “repeatedly called police to the scene,” with five cars showing up on one call.
If enacted, the New York legislation would make the state comparable to the U.K., where silent prayer near abortion clinics has gotten March for Life U.K. Director Isabel Vaughan-Spruce repeatedly investigated by police even after a court exoneration and a police settlement.
She pleaded not guilty in January to the latest charges, arguing a local buffer zone law does not prohibit “mere presence,” and faces trial this fall. The BBC recently featured Vaughan-Spruce in a profile of young U.K. pro-life activists taking inspiration from American counterparts including the late Charlie Kirk.
The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, already feuding with “memelord” Hochul over her self-exempting crackdown on AI-generated political speech, portrayed the New York legislation as uniquely sweeping at least in this legislative season.
“None of the other state bills I’ve come across this year that propose restrictions on protests or interference with houses of worship are anywhere near as broad as these, perhaps because the Supreme Court has already struck down more limited buffer zones around abortion clinics,” Carolyn Iodice, the group’s legislative and policy director, told Just the News.
FIRE staff walked around New York City documenting areas they say would be off-limits for protest regardless of viewpoint: Times Square, Broadway, Washington Square Park in the center of New York University, Wall Street and Zucotti Park of #OccupyWallStreet fame.
Iodice said it’s “frankly pretty shocking to look at the actual effect of the bills.”
