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May 26, 2011

The U. S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled today that Sudanese Christian Pastor George Saieg has a free speech right to distribute religious literature on public sidewalks and evangelize Muslims during the Annual Arab International Festival held each year in Dearborn, Michigan.

For five years Saieg, who specifically ministers to Muslims, had been discussing his Christian faith and passing out literature on Dearborn’s sidewalks during the Festival without encountering any problems. Nevertheless, in 2009 police officials informed him he had to remain in a booth, prohibiting him from distributing his literature on the nearby sidewalks and public streets.

Dearborn is one of the most densely populated Muslim communities in the United States.  It has the largest Mosque in North America.  In the past few years Dearborn has gained national attention for taking a pro-Muslim stance and for the arrest and intimidation of Christian evangelists for engaging in protected speech activity.

The Thomas More Law Center (TMLC), a national conservative Christian public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, filed the federal lawsuit on behalf of Pastor Saieg in 2009, naming the City of Dearborn and its police chief, Ronald Haddad, as defendants.  The case was handled by TMLC Senior Trial Counsel Rob Muise.

In ruling for Saieg, the court recognized the problem Saieg had with booth-based evangelizing: “the penalty of leaving Islam according to Islamic books is death,” which makes Muslims reluctant to approach a booth that is publically “labeled as … Christian.”

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Saieg – Judge’s Opinion.pdf	75.6 KB

Yesterday afternoon, both Thomas More Law Center (TMLC) and Department of Justice lawyers filed letter briefs requested by the panel of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati which will hear oral arguments next week on Obamacare.

The court requested that letter briefs of not more than 10 pages be filed by the parties to address the issues of standing and ripeness and whether the challenge to the individual mandate of Obamacare was a facial or as-applied challenge.

If the Sixth Circuit holds that the plaintiffs do not have standing to pursue their claim, the court would dismiss the case without reaching the merits on the grounds that it lacks jurisdiction.

TMLC was the first to challenge Obamacare, claiming that Congress did not have authority under the Commerce Clause to adopt the individual mandate.  Although Detroit Federal District Court Judge Steeh, a Clinton appointee, dismissed the case, he specifically found that TMLC and its clients had standing to bring it.

Oral argument on the case in front of the 3-judge panel is scheduled to take place on June 1, 2011 at 1:30 PM.  The three-judge panel includes Judge Boyce F. Martin, Jr., a Carter appointee, Judge Jeffrey S. Sutton, a George W. Bush appointee, and Judge James L. Graham, a Reagan appointee who is a senior federal district court judge sitting on the panel by designation.
TMLC challenged Obamacare because of its concern that it would result in government seizure of unprecedented power over the lives of the American people.

Under Obamacare, every individual, regardless of whether they want to or not, must obtain the required level of health care insurance (determined by the government) or pay a penalty for failing to do so.

Never before has Congress enacted a law that forces people to purchase a service (such as health insurance) from a private company or face a penalty.  In an attempt to legally justify its power to enact such a draconian law, Congress expressly pointed to the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, which gives Congress the power to regulate “Commerce . . . among the several States.”  That Clause has never been interpreted to give Congress the power to regulate the lives of individuals simply because they exist.

 

 

 

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Department of Justice – Letter brief – filed.pdf	119.28 KB
Thomas More Law Center – Letter brief – Filed.pdf	53.08 KB
Sixth Circuit – Briefing letter – Filed.pdf	99.1 KB

May 4, 2011

Thomas More Law Center (TMLC) Senior Trial Counsel Robert Muise will defend the right of public high school teacher Brad Johnson to display patriotic banners in his classroom before a panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals tomorrow at 9:00 a.m. PST in Pasadena, California. The Poway Unified School District in California ordered Johnson to take down his banners that contained historical slogans such as “In God We Trust,” “One Nation under God,” as well as the preamble to the Constitution, because “they may offend a Muslim student.”

Johnson had been displaying the banners for twenty-five years.  He was ordered to remove them in 2007.  Because of the national significance of this case, C-SPAN will be videotaping the oral arguments, which will be broadcasted at a later date.

In a classic example of discrimination against anything Christian, the School District allowed religious classroom displays by other teachers, including displays included a 35 to 40-foot string of Tibetan prayer flags with images of Buddha; a poster with the lyrics from John Lennon’s anti-religion song “Imagine;” a poster with Hindu leader Mahatma Gandhi’s “7 Social Sins”; a poster of Muslim leader Malcolm X; and a poster of Buddhist leader, the Dalai Lama.

TMLC filed a federal lawsuit in 2007 against the Poway Unified School District, alleging that the school district violated Johnson’s constitutional rights by imposing a viewpoint-based restriction on his speech.

In February 2010, Federal District Court Judge Roger T. Benitez ruled in favor of Johnson in a 32-page strongly worded opinion critical of the Poway school district’s aversion to mentioning God:

“[The school district officials] apparently fear their students are incapable of dealing with diverse viewpoints that include God’s place in American history and culture. . . .  That God places prominently in our Nation’s history does not create an Establishment Clause violation requiring curettage and disinfectant for Johnson’s public high school classroom walls.  It is a matter of historical fact that our institutions and government actors have in past and present times given place to a supreme God.”

Shortly after his ruling, however, the School District board voted to appeal Judge Benitez’s ruling at a closed-session meeting.

This past Friday, an angry, hate-filled, unruly, mostly Muslim mob of several hundred people broke through police barricades and rushed across the street toward Pastor Terry Jones while he was speaking in front of the Dearborn, Michigan City Hall.  The mob was yelling and screaming, making obscene gestures, holding Korans, throwing shoes and water bottles at Pastor Jones and his supporters.

 

Resembling riots in the Middle East, the mob waved Palestinian and Lebanese flags while hurling profanities in Arabic and English at Jones and his group of supporters.  As Pastor Jones cautioned the crowd to honor and obey the Constitution, they booed loudly, jeered, and whistled to drown him out.

Riot police finally had to intervene to prevent the crowd from getting to Pastor Jones and his supporters.  The police were eventually able to push the mob back across the street, but not until several of Jones’ supporters had been hit with shoes and other projectiles hurled by the angry mob.

Click here to see video footage of the Dearborn mob

Dearborn, Michigan has the largest mosque in North America; moreover, with 30,000 of its 98,000 residents being Muslim, it has the largest concentration of Muslims than any other American city.

The City of Dearborn denied a permit for Pastor Jones and Associate Pastor Wayne Sapp to protest Sharia law and Jihad on April 22, 2011, on public property in front of the Dearborn mosque. Subsequently, the county prosecutor used an arcane statute dealing with peace bonds to file a complaint to prevent the pastors from speaking in order to “prevent crime.” The judge ordered Pastor Jones and Sapp to appear before the court, which ultimately resulted in an order to either pay a peace bond or face jail.  Both Pastor Jones and Pastor Sapp were thrown in jail and were not released until after they paid the peace bond.  The judge also ordered them stay away from the mosque and adjacent property for three years (now being appealed by the Thomas More Law Center).

Click here to see the Order

On April 29, Pastors Jones and Sapp returned to Dearborn and gave their speech in front of City Hall.

Legal organizations including the ACLU, which vehemently opposed the content of Pastor Jones’s speech, as well as media commentators across the political spectrum, decried Dearborn’s violation of Jones’s constitutional right to free speech. The Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan has agreed to represent Jones and Sapp, without charge, in their appeal of this unconstitutional suppression of speech.

Richard Thompson, President and Chief Counsel of the Thomas More Law Center commented, “The constitutional right to free speech means that government cannot suppress speech just because it or a majority of society disagrees with the content of that speech.  Nor can government charge someone a price to engage in free speech.”

The actions of the Muslim demonstrators were a stark contrast to Pastor Jones’s peaceful supporters, many of which stood holding American flags as they listened to his speech against radical Muslims, opposition to Sharia law in the U.S., and support of the Constitution.
Dearborn’s mayor, Jack O’Reilly, has a history of pandering to his large Muslim constituency.

In early March 2011, he appeared on CNN to oppose House Homeland Security Chairman Congressman Pete King’s (R-NY) investigation on the extent of Radicalization in the American Muslim Community. Moreover, the Mayor’s administration has engaged in a pattern of harassment of Christians who have attempted to minister to Muslims.

In June 2009, Dearborn police enforced a rule that prevented Sudanese Christian pastor George Saeig from distributing Christian religious literature during the annual Dearborn Arab Festival.  The Thomas More Law Center is representing Pastor Saeig in that case. In June 2010, again at the Dearborn Arab Festival, four Christian missionaries were arrested on breach of the peace of charges while they were peaceably discussing their Christian faith with a group of Muslim youth.  In September 2010, after a five-day jury trial, the missionaries, represented by Thomas More Law Center attorney Rob Muise, were found not guilty.

Continuing his pattern of pandering to his Muslim constituency, Mayor O’Reilly blamed the lawlessness of the mob on Pastor Jones, rather than on the mob itself.

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JUDGES ORDER – Terry Jones.pdf	131.35 KB