Last week, at a district justice's office just north of here, two Amishmen pulled up in buggies, came out of the snow into the warm and were found guilty of failing to mount state-mandated reflective orange triangles on their carriages.The fine was $100 apiece.
An hour later, at a district justice's office 10 miles to the north, the routine was repeated, this time with three Amishmen, all found guilty, each fined $100.
Nobody paid up, though.
"We don't think it's too much to impose on these people. It's good enough for everybody else," said Ted Farabaugh, a township supervisor in West Carroll Township, home to many of the Swartzentrubers. "Take away the triangle, and people have less chance to see the buggies. Then, there's going to be a head-on collision, with people trying to avoid them."
In Ohio, the largest single Amish enclave in the world, a study done through the state Department of Transportation and Ohio State University branded the orange reflective triangle "the single most recognizable emblem" to mark slow-moving traffic. That's important, Ohio Highway Patrol Lt. Joel Smith said, since the driver of a 55-mph vehicle bearing down on a 5-mph buggy will see the gap between them close from 500 feet to 44 feet in six seconds.
The new cases, and any more that come along, will be joined in a court fight framing a state traffic code provision as infringing on religious liberties of a small sliver of the state's Amish population, said Witold Walczak, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Greater Pittsburgh Chapter.
The fight centers on a tiny, 88-year-old branch called Swartzentruber Amish, rigid by even mainline Amish standards. While the rest of the Amish spectrum has adopted, sometimes grudgingly, the orange triangles, the Swartzentrubers refuse.
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