Appeals Court Throws out Missouri Law Banning Noisy Protests at Houses of Worship

By Mark Morris
Kansas City Star
March 9, 2015

http://www.kansascity.com/news/local/crime/article13108751.html

A Missouri law prohibiting “profane,” “rude” and “indecent” protests outside churches, synagogues and mosques is unconstitutional, a federal appeals court ruled Monday.

Ruling in favor of organizations and individuals who have protested outside Catholic churches and facilities, a three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that the Missouri House of Worship Protection Act violates the First Amendment because it seeks to restrict the content of the protesters’ speech.

The act, passed in 2012, prohibited intentionally disturbing a “house of worship by using profane discourse, rude or indecent behavior … either within the house of worship or so near it as to disturb the order and solemnity of the worship services.”

Other so-called “content neutral” methods, such as noise regulations, exist for protecting religious services from unreasonable disruption, the panel noted.

“Disagreement with a message, even a profane or rude message, does not permit its suppression,” the judges found.