Posted on 01/12/2010 6:36:40 AM PST by EternalVigilance
If:
it is unwful to treat
pro-life demonstrators
as trespassers
unless
pro-abortion demonstrators
are also treated as trespassers,
Then:
it is unwful to treat
pro-abortion demonstrators
as trespassers
unless
pro-life demonstrators
are also treated as trespassers.
Are you saying that if tomorrow Notre Dame University suddenly started acting as if it were Catholic, the university would not be able to prevent a gay pride demonstration or a pro-abortion demonstration on campus?
They can do what they want. In fact, if Father Jenkins wanted to he could have all these charges dismissed immediately.
If NDU is private property, then NDU can discriminate against whatever viewpoint NDU wishes.
In this context, the 1st Amendment does not apply to private property owners.
Your proper outrage at NDU’s choices seems to blind you to sound legal reasoning and a sound understanding of the Constitutional right of private property owners to control the speech activities that occur on their own private property.
You are not making any sense now.
NDU is free under the Constitution to decide
that pro-aborts are NOT trespassing on NDU’s private property,
and that pro-lifers ARE trespassing on NDU’s private property.
What is it that you don’t understand?
You are correct to note that NDU was stupid to do so,
but that does not make it illegal or unconstitutional.
In fact, your views are very dangerous because you are advocating that private property owners cannot control who has access to its private property.
They can do what they want - they even have the right as private property owners to act like atheist secularists.
Being stupid and immoral (in this instance and under mosts circumstances) is not illegal or unconstitutional.
You’re adding to my words. You really shouldn’t do that.
HOW COULD BC LOSE TO THEM?!
Good, I am glad that we agree:
1. NDU’s actions are indefensible from a Catholic perspective.
2. Private property owners have a constitutional and moral right to decide which demonstrators are allowed on their private property and which demonstrators will be treated as trespassers.
3. The free-speech rights of demonstrators end at the private property line.
No, free speech rights don’t end at a private property line.
Of course private property rights allow the owner to decide who is on his property.
But the public has a right to an expectation that such rights won’t be enforced with arbitrary arrest and the application of physical force when it comes to what are normally areas which are wide open to the public.
Notre Dame created much confusion in this regard by the extremely liberally biased, ham-handed way they handled these protests.
Are you claiming that the pro-lifers were not warned that any form of pro-life protest on the NDU campus during the Obama visit would be unwelcome by the property owner?
And if you are letting untold numbers of strangers have the run of your "Private" campus, like on graduation day, it is no longer private.
Notre Dame University is a cesspool and is off the rails morally speaking, but that does not that NDU does not enjoy private property rights.
Can you cite anything to support your assertions about the law? You have asserted 2 grounds upon which a private college in the USA has lost its right to eject trespassers, both of which should trouble constitutionalists and people of faith:
1. A private institution that offers any kind of service or program whatsoever to the public is a de facto “public accomodation”, and as such has no right to eject trespassers.
2. A private institution that holds a large ceremony that thousands of people will attend loses its right to eject trepsassers.
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