ACLJ: Supreme Court Protects Free Speech of Pro-Life Movement in Striking Down Abortion Clinic Buffer Zone

(Washington, DC) - The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), which filed an amicus brief at the Supreme Court challenging a speech-free zone around abortion clinics in Massachusetts, applauded today’s decision by the Supreme Court that strikes down an abortion clinic buffer zone.

In a unanimous decision today, the high court struck down Massachusetts’ buffer zone law, a law that prohibited any person within a 35-foot radius of an abortion clinic entrance or driveway from approaching another person “for the purpose of passing a leaflet or handbill to, displaying a sign to, or engaging in oral protest, education, or counseling with such other person.”

“This decision is a watershed in the movement to undo the infamous ‘abortion distortion’ – the judicial distortion in free-speech jurisprudence that effectively denies full free speech rights to the pro-life movement,” said Jay Sekulow, Chief Counsel of the ACLJ. “This is a sensible and constitutionally-sound decision that sends a message to the Obama Administration and pro-abortion state governments: pro-life speech is free speech, fully protected by the First Amendment. The pro-life movement is now more free to take its life-saving message to the people who need to hear it the most.”

The ACLJ has a decades-long history of battling for pro-life free speech at the Supreme Court. Led by ACLJ Chief Counsel Jay Sekulow, the ACLJ is based in Washington, D.C.