Blogs by David A. Schwinghammer
Fred Phelps
4/2/2010 10:21:01 AM
Albert Snyder has been ordered to pay $16,000 in court costs to Fred Phelps.
In case you're not familiar with this civil case, Albert Snyder sued Fred Phelps, Baptist minister from Topeka, Kansas, for damages after Phelps and his crew showed up at Lance Corporal Matthew Snyder's funeral, chanting homophobic and unpatriotic slurs.
A lower court awarded Snyder eleven million dollars in damages. Upon appeal it was reduced to five million and finally dropped all together. The appeals court judge stuck Snyder with Phelps' court costs. Why would a judge make this kind of decision? Did it have something to do with the American Nazi Party's march through Skokie, Illinois, home of Holocaust survivors? The march was protected under first amendment rights. (Luckily it never took place, but it would've been legal, probably a legal bloodbath).
Seems to me that Phelps Inc. was invading the Snyder families right to privacy. There's also the question of, Where do your rights end and my rights begin? The gauge I've always felt was correct was, You can't yell fire in a crowded movie theater. If that's not what Phelps was doing, I don't know what to think. Lately, The Patriots, a collection of veterans, American Legion and VFW members, have been showing up at military funerals to give Phelps a taste of his own medicine if he tries this again. Either Phelps hasn't shown up or he's been quiet about it.
Anyway, the Supreme Court has agreed to hear Snyder's case, and I'm wondering what Antonin Scalia and his four stooges will do. They just jettisoned ninety years of precedent, declaring that corporations have the same first amendment rights as individuals, making it easier for companies to make their own commercials, like the one about Hillary Clinton that was supressed in the last election.
I will admit that I do not like Antonin Scalia. It seems the man makes up his mind before he hears the case, then rationalizes the decision. I think he has a lot of gall calling the four liberals political judges. I first heard him speak at Macalester University in St. Paul. He had just been confirmed, and we got to ask some questions. I wanted to know about the Hazelwood Case. I was a high school journalism adviser at the time, and some students were suing to prevent their principal from censoring their newspaper. Scalia ducked the question, but later sided with the principals, completely defeating the purpose of the high school newspaper. As I recall he said something about the possibility of students promoting the use of marijuana.
Later I saw him on "Sixty Minutes" bragging about his elementary school report card on which he got all A's.
I can't remember one instance where I'm actually agreed with a Scalia decision. Could this be the time? One would think that a conservative would side with poor Albert and the memory of Matthew, but knowing Scalia I have my doubts.
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