This week the state of Massachusetts has agreed to pay Eleanor McCullen’s attorneys fees in the sum of $1,241,567 and change.
McCullen challenged the Massachusetts abortion clinic buffer zone bill, taking the case all the way to the US Supreme Court.
The US Supreme Court overturned the Massachusetts law by a unanimous 9-0 decision.
This week, the US District court in Massachusetts has signed off on an agreement between McCullen’s attorneys and the state of Massachusetts for the sum of $1.24 Million dollars to cover attorneys fees. (I hope Mass Taxpayers consider that money well spent.)
You know, NH has a very similar anti-free speech abortion buffer zone bill still on the books…
In the run up to that Supreme Court decision (McCullen v. Coakley), the New Hampshire legislature proposed and passed a similar buffer zone bill. The legislation (SB 319) was sponsored by 8 members of the legislature ( 3 house 5 Senate) including three of those so-called well-meaning, gentle RINO’s grazing lazily in the upper chamber – Sen. Odell, Dist 8; Sen. Stiles, Dist 24; and Sen. Bradley.
Despite calls from Conservative and Life Groups to wait until after SCOTUS issued their opinion the gentle RINO’s and their drooling Democrat enablers in the Democrat majority House passed the bill, which despite further calls for patience, Democrat governor Maggie Hassan signed into law.
They couldn’t wait to infringe on people’s rights of speech and assembly.
NH’s SB 319 hit the legislature the first week of session in 2014. It passed its final hurdle in the same legislature on May 22nd, 2014. And Governor Hassan signed it into law on June 10th, 2014 (SB319 Docket) at which point it went into effect.
Two weeks and two days later the US Supreme Court issued its decision in the Massachusetts case effectively making the 15 day old New Hampshire law unconstitutional.
And we still get crap for busting on RINO’s.
Within a month of the Supreme Court decision a judge issued a court order blocking enforcement of the new law in New Hampshire.
All for nothing, and no desire to repeal it. Calls for a special session to undo the unconstitutional bill were ignored by then Democrat speaker Norelli (now retired) and it remains to be seen whether the new legislature will act to remove the unconstitutional law from the books.
If not, there is a chance that should someone feel the law has been enforced or in any way applied in the Granite State, despite the court order blocking enforcement, a lawsuit could arise, costing New Hampshire taxpayers a significant sum in legal fees.
It seems unlikely but it is not beyond the realm of possibility.
The New Hampshire Legislature should take a few minutes out of their busy-bee progressive tinkering to repeal the unconstitutional law before someone steps in something that might end up costing even more taxpayer dollars than were wasted pushing SB319 through the colon of government in the first place.
Documents
[pdf] http://granitegrok.com/wp-content/uploads/MJD-PDM-signatures-McCullen-fees.pdf [/pdf]
[pdf] http://granitegrok.com/wp-content/uploads/Document-182-main.pdf [/pdf]
[pdf] http://granitegrok.com/wp-content/uploads/Document-183.pdf [/pdf]
