When the U.S. Supreme Court opens its fall term this week, much attention will be given to a landmark church/state case on the docket (see “Uncle Sam v. First Church,” p. 38). However, the justices have scheduled several key cases on other controversial issues as well.
In Bray v. Alexandria Women’s Health Clinic, the high court will decide if a Reconstruction-era civil-rights law may be used to prevent Operation Rescue-style demonstrations at abortion clinics. At issue is whether women seeking abortions constitutes a valid class of citizens protected under the Civil Rights Act of 1871, known as the Ku Klux Klan Act.
The case arose when the National Organization for Women (NOW) attempted to prevent prolife activists from blocking the entrances to nine northern Virginia abortion clinics. NOW brought suit against the prolifers under the Klan Act, charging that the rescues were a conspiracy to deny women their constitutional rights.
Lower courts have agreed with NOW’S assertion that the rescues are tantamount to discrimination against women. If those rulings stand, abortion clinics around the country could use the Klan Act argument to get injunctions against prolifers and to ask the courts to impose fines against them.
Among those urging the Supreme Court to overturn the lower-court decisions is Feminists for Life (FFL). “The historical record of early feminist opposition to abortion demonstrates that at the time of the passage of the Ku Klux Klan Act, opposition to abortion was premised not upon animus against women, but upon the conviction that abortion constituted the oppression of women as well as the killing of children,” the FFL court brief argues.
In Jacobson v. United States, the Court will examine whether a former school-bus driver who purchased child pornography in a government sting operation was unfairly coerced by federal officials. Keith Jacobson was targeted by postal and customs authorities after agents obtained his name from the mailing list of a known pornography distributor.
The National Coalition Against Pornography’s newly formed National Law Center filed a brief urging the Court to uphold the convictions. “A favorable decision by the Supreme Court will effectively eliminate any question regarding the constitutionality of [such sting operations],” said attorney Gene Malpas, noting that many antipornography sting cases are still pending.
