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Court Clarifies Abortion Protest Ground Rules

On a 6-1 vote, justices overrule 'floating buffer zone'

WASHINGTON (AllPolitics, Feb. 19) -- Anti-abortion protestors must stay at least 15 feet away from clinics, but they are free to approach patients and clinic staff members on the street or sidewalk, the Supreme Court ruled today.

On an 8-1 vote, with Justice Stephen G. Breyer disagreeing, the court struck down a New York judge's order for a 15-foot "floating buffer zone" around patients as they go to and from a clinic.

At the same time, protesters must back off if patients tell them they do want to talk about their decision, the court said.

"We strike down the floating buffer zones around people entering and leaving the clinics because they burden more speech than is necessary to serve the relevant government interests," Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist wrote.

"The floating buffer zones prevent defendants -- except for two sidewalk counselors while they are tolerated by the targeted individual -- from communicating a message from a normal conversational distance or handing leaflets to people entering or leaving the clinics who are walking on the public sidewalks," Rehnquist said.

On a separate 6-3 vote, the court upheld the requirement that demonstrators stay at least 15 feet away from abortion clinics. In the majority were Rehnquist and Justices Breyer, John Paul Stevens, Sandra Day O'Connor, David H. Souter and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Voting to strike down all of the New York judge's order were Justices Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas.

Karen Swallow Prior, who organized 1992 anti-abortion protests in Buffalo that led to the case, told The Associated Press: "The ruling basically says that pro-lifers have the same First Amendment rights that the rest of Americans do."