...because if you are part of a religion that issues fatwahs, you are legally entitled to issue a "heckler's veto."
Discussions about this case have been flitting around the internet for the last week, but I didn't know the fact, which are reported here:
A legal expert, a former Navy chaplain, and a pro-family leader agree that a Pennsylvania judge should be removed from the bench for throwing out an assault case lodged against a Muslim who attacked an atheist dressed as a zombie Muhammad at a Halloween parade last year.
Judge Mark Martin is an Iraq war veteran and a convert to Islam, according to George Washington University law professor Jonathon Turley. The incident, recorded on video, occurred on October 11, 2011 at the Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania Halloween parade. Ernie Perce, an atheist, was attacked by Talaag Elbayomy, a Muslim, because of the former's costume.
Judge Martin threw out video evidence of the assault, dismissed the testimony of an eyewitness officer, and then lectured the atheist victim about the sensitivities of the Muslim culture. He stated in court that Elbayomy was obligated to attack the victim because of his culture and religion.
"They are so immersed in it," he said. "And what you've done is you've completely trashed their essence, their being. They find it very, very, very offensive. I'm a Muslim. I find it offensive."
Apparently, Martin actually said "If I were a Muslim...."
And:
Professor Turley also notes that another atheist, dressed as a zombie Pope, was marching beside the zombie Muhammad, but no outraged Catholics attacked him.
"If a Christian had been doing the harassing, I don't believe the judge would have dismissed those charges," Gramley contends. "I think in this case, Judge Martin is showing preference to the Muslim."
Here is the NRO story, with a transcript of Martin's comments.
The Volokh Conspiracy provides this follow-up:
From a CNN interview (starting at 2:15):
Interviewer: When I spoke to him over the phone, Judge Martin acknowledged it’s his job to protect the rights of people like the atheist, no matter how offensive they might be.
Interviewer to Judge Martin: … There are some who believe you were failing to protect that right.
Judge Martin: No, I don’t think so. Here’s the thing: It’s a right, it’s not a privilege, it’s a right. With rights come responsibilities. The more that people abuse our rights, the more likely that we’re going to lose them.
But I don’t quite see how this is “the thing,” at least in the sense of an explanation of the judge’s actions at the trial. I don’t think that we’re in danger of losing our free speech rights because some people say things that are offensive to Muslims. I do think that free speech rights are in danger when judges berate alleged crime victims for their anti-Islam speech, and thus convey the message that the legal system may be biased against those who engage in such speech and may fail to protect those people because of such speech.
This judge is nuts. It's his job to protect free speech rights, even for socially-autistic atheist jerks who undoubtedly deserve a good ass-kicking.
The idea that the police are supposed to protect even obnoxious and offensive attacks on religious minorities - at least when they are Catholic - was exemplified in Cantwell v. Conn., 310 U.S. 296 (U.S. 1940, where the United States Supreme Court reversed the defendants' convictions for unauthorized soliciting and inciting a breach of the peace.
The facts of Cantwell show an amazing insousiance on the part of the defendants and their trust in the American legal system. As described in the case:
The facts adduced to sustain the convictions on the third count follow. On the day of their arrest the appellants were engaged in going singly from house to house on Cassius Street in New Haven. They were individually equipped with a bag containing books and pamphlets on religious subjects, a portable phonograph and a set of records, each of which, when played, introduced, and was a description of, one of the books. Each appellant asked the person who responded to his call for permission to play one of the records. If permission was granted he asked the person to buy the book described and, upon refusal, he solicited such contribution towards the publication of the pamphlets as the listener was willing to make. If a contribution was received a pamphlet was delivered upon condition that it would be read.
Cassius Street is in a thickly populated neighborhood, where about ninety per cent of the residents are Roman Catholics. A phonograph record, describing a book entitled "Enemies," included an attack on the Catholic religion.
Cantwell v. Conn., 310 U.S. 296, 301 (U.S. 1940)
And:
The facts which were held to support the conviction of Jesse Cantwell on the fifth count were that he stopped [*303] two men in the street, asked, and received, permission to play a phonograph record, and played the record "Enemies," which attacked the religion and church of the two men, who were Catholics. Both were incensed by the contents of the record and were tempted to strike Cantwell unless he went away. On being told to be on his way he left their presence. There was no evidence that he was personally offensive or entered into any argument with those he interviewed.
Cantwell v. Conn., 310 U.S. 296, 302-303 (U.S. 1940)
Picture the facts: a bunch of Jehova Witnesses invade a working-class Catholic neighborhood to play a record accusing the Catholic Church of being the anti-christ.
It's amazing that these JWs managed to get out with their life, much less a good thrashing.
It also reflects well upon working-class Catholics in a less-enlightened time that they didn't administer said thrashing.
Naturally, the police felt that there was the potential for a sound thrashing of a couple of scrawny JWs by a neighborhood filled with outraged working-class Catholics, so they arrested the JWs on breach of the peace.
The court was having any of that "breach of the peace" talk on that day:
The offense known as breach of the peace embraces a great variety of conduct destroying or menacing public order and tranquility. It includes not only violent acts but acts and words likely to produce violence in others. No one would have the hardihood to suggest that the principle of freedom of speech sanctions incitement to riot or that religious liberty connotes the privilege to exhort others to physical attack upon those belonging to another sect. When clear and present danger of riot, disorder, interference with traffic upon the public streets, or other immediate threat to public safety, peace, or order, appears, the power of the State to prevent or punish is obvious. Equally obvious is it that a State may not unduly suppress free communication of views, religious or other, under the guise of conserving desirable conditions. Here we have a situation analogous to a conviction under a statute sweeping in a great variety of conduct under a general and indefinite characterization, and leaving to the executive and judicial branches too wide a discretion in its application.
Having these considerations in mind, we note that Jesse Cantwell, on April 26, 1938, was upon a public street, where he had a right to be, and where he had a right peacefully to impart his views to others. There is no showing that his deportment was noisy, truculent, overbearing or offensive. He requested of two pedestrians permission to play to them a phonograph record. The permission was granted. It is not claimed that he [*309] intended to insult or affront the hearers by playing the record. It is plain that he wished only to interest them in his propaganda. The sound of the phonograph is not shown to have disturbed residents of the street, to have drawn a crowd, or to have impeded traffic. Thus far he had invaded no right or interest of the public or of the men accosted.
The record played by Cantwell embodies a general attack on all organized religious systems as instruments of Satan and injurious to man; it then singles out the Roman Catholic Church for strictures couched in terms which naturally would offend not only persons of that persuasion, [**906] but all others who respect the honestly held religious faith of their fellows. The hearers were in fact highly offended. One of them said he felt like hitting Cantwell and the [***1221] other that he was tempted to throw Cantwell off the street. The one who testified he felt like hitting Cantwell said, in answer to the question "Did you do anything else or have any other reaction?" "No, sir, because he said he would take the victrola and he went." The other witness testified that he told Cantwell he had better get off the street before something happened to him and that was the end of the matter as Cantwell picked up his books and walked up the street.
Cantwell v. Conn., 310 U.S. 296, 308-309 (U.S. 1940)
And:
In the realm of religious faith, and in that of political belief, sharp differences arise. In both fields the tenets of one man may seem the rankest error to his neighbor. To persuade others to his own point of view, the pleader, as we know, at times, resorts to exaggeration, to vilification of men who have been, or are, prominent in church or state, and even to false statement. But the people of this nation have ordained in the light of history, that, in spite of the probability of excesses and abuses, these liberties are, in the long view, essential to enlightened opinion and right conduct on the part of the citizens of a democracy.
The essential characteristic of these liberties is, that under their shield many types of life, character, opinion and belief can develop unmolested and unobstructed. Nowhere is this shield more necessary than in our own country for a people composed of many races and of many creeds. There are limits to the exercise of these liberties. The danger in these times from the coercive activities of those who in the delusion of racial or religious conceit would incite violence and breaches of the peace in order to deprive others of their equal right to the exercise of their liberties, is emphasized by events familiar to all. These and other transgressions of those limits the States appropriately may punish.
Cantwell v. Conn., 310 U.S. 296, 310 (U.S. 1940)
So, to recap, back in the day, Catholics were supposed to withstand rank provocations like true gentlemen and did; today, Muslims aren't and don't.
It certainly appears that 70 years of "progress" in diversity, victimization and multi-culturalism have not yielded much progress in making better citizens.
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