Supreme Court appears skeptical over keeping homophobe's names private

[Bluebear]

WASHINGTON -- Supreme Court justices appeared skeptical Wednesday about keeping secret the names of people who signed a petition to repeal Washington state's gay rights law, suggesting citizens cannot always hide behind anonymity if they want to be heard.

Opponents of gay rights want the court to keep the names private to avoid intimidation by the other side. But several justices questioned whether allowing petitioners to stay anonymous might imperil other vital open records like voter registration and lists of donors to political candidates.

"The fact is that running a democracy takes a certain amount of civic courage," Justice Antonin Scalia said. "And the First Amendment does not protect you from criticism or even nasty phone calls when you exercise your political rights to legislate or to take part in the legislative process."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/28/AR2010042800453.html

[MadMaddie]

1. I live in WA and if someone wants to take my rights away

then they need to pull their homophobic sheet off and show us who they are. They are fighting this because I bet that their businesses or churches are dealing with many different walks of life.

[cliffordu]

2. Yep. Cowardice shouldn't be protected.

even if it costs them money.

[Mojeoux]

3. This same question came up in the prop 8 challenges here in Ca.

So this issue will have ramifications here too.

I think their reasoning is akin to their mythology that gays will be fine if they just stay closeted.
So if you were threatened because you showed you were gay, by their logic, it's your fault for inviting all the threats.

Similar to the "Don't make me hit you!" concept of domestic abusers.

[Meldread]

4. I can't believe I agree with Justice Antonin Scalia on something. The Rapture is coming!

"The fact is that running a democracy takes a certain amount of civic courage," Justice Antonin Scalia said. "And the First Amendment does not protect you from criticism or even nasty phone calls when you exercise your political rights to legislate or to take part in the legislative process."

----

Bopp said people who signed the petition faced the prospect of harassment. Scalia called that "touchy-feely, oh-so sensitive."

"You know, you can't run a democracy this way, with everybody being afraid of having his political positions known," Scalia said.

"I'm sorry, Justice Scalia, but the campaign manager of this initiative had his family sleep in his living room because of the threats," Bopp replied.

Scalia said threats should be moved against vigorously. "But just because there can be criminal activity doesn't mean that you have to eliminate a procedure that is otherwise perfectly reasonable."

----

Alito and Roberts seem to be against releasing the names. Could be interesting if Scalia votes with the liberals on this issue. Assuming, of course, the liberals hang together - which isn't certain.

[tavalon]

5. See, even Washington state has idiots in it

Granted, not so much in my area, but there are some areas..............

[petronius]

6. Justice who said what now?

Damn, I had to read that three times, but the "civic courage" quote is right on the money. Of course, the exact same argument could be made with regard to secret ballots...

[dmr]

7. I was going to make these 2 points, but they're already in the article:

Making the petition names public also helps the state fight fraud, McKenna said. And "it's also about finding plain old mistakes which the state, the secretary of state, or auditor has missed."

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg noted that while Protect Marriage Washington says it wants to keep the petition names anonymous, organizers of petitions often make the names public themselves by selling the names to other organizations and using them for fundraising.

"So that would be the end of a person's privacy," she said.