On June 10, 2014, NH Governor Maggie Hassan, now a US Senator, signed an unconstitutional buffer zone bill into law that allows an abortion business to designate up to 25 feet of the public sidewalk and street as a no-free-speech zone where even silent prayer is banned.
On June 26, 2014, just over two weeks later, the US Supreme Court struck down an almost identical buffer zone law in Massachusetts as unconstitutional.
Related: ACLU-NH’s Double Standard on Freedom of Speech
Escaped slave and abolitionist Frederick Douglass said:
Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one’s thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist. That, of all rights, is the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down.”
Maggie Hassan, the legislators that helped her to pass the buffer zone law, and the legislators that have helped to defeat bill after bill to repeal the law for 7 1/2 long years are on the side of tyrants.
I wrote about the hypocrisy of the NH Democrat state reps who knelt in protest during the national anthem at NH House sessions but voted against repealing a law that allows private abortion businesses to ban kneeling in prayer on public sidewalks.
Cornerstone described the buffer zone law:
The New Hampshire law reads: “No person shall knowingly enter or remain on a public way or sidewalk adjacent to a reproductive health care facility within a radius up to 25 feet of any portion of an entrance [of an abortion business],” and then proceeds to outline exceptions for abortion employees.
Individuals, of course, have a constitutionally protected right to be in public places. … a court would likely view any concern that the presence of individuals and their possessions in public places may make others feel uncomfortable as insufficiently compelling to justify an intrusion on one’s right to be in a public place, especially where the person being impacted has not committed a crime. The Constitution, of course, does not protect individuals from feeling uncomfortable.
On June 11, 2014, one day after the buffer zone bill was signed into law, Gilles Bissonnette submitted testimony in defense of sidewalk chalkers in Keene:
It is worth noting that public sidewalks and streets, as the New Hampshire Supreme Court has explained, are “fundamental to the continuing vitality of our democracy, for ‘time out of mind, [they] have been used for purposes of assembly, communicating thoughts between citizens, and discussing public questions.’
Bissonnette’s statements would be very appropriate in defense of the repeal of the buffer zone. Perversely, the ACLU-NH lobbied to pass the buffer zone law and since the Supreme Court struck it down, they have not made any effort to correct their mistake by helping to repeal it. The words “Civil Liberties” in their name no longer have any meaning.
Here is your chance to fight for everyone’s right to stand, kneel, pray, and speak on the public sidewalk. HB1625 is going to be heard in the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, February 9 at 1:00 pm in Reps Hall in the NH State House. Please sign-in in support of HB1625. You can also contact the Judiciary Committee and ask them to vote Ought To Pass on the bill.
Learn more about the history of the buffer zone at Leaven for the Loaf and on Facebook at Stop the NH Buffer Zone.
