A pro-life sidewalk counseling organization asked the Supreme Court last week to invalidate a Carbondale, Illinois, law that forbids protests and outreach within a so-called bubble zone outside abortion clinics.
The group, Coalition Life, argues that the 2023 law violates sidewalk counselors’ First Amendment right to approach women near abortion facilities to advise them of alternatives to abortion. Similar laws exist in other states such as New Hampshire and Montana.
The local disorderly conduct ordinance being challenged makes it illegal—within 100 feet of a hospital, medical clinic, or health care facility— to come within eight feet of another person with the intention of distributing leaflets, displaying signs, or participating in protest, education, or counseling.
Coalition Life, which is active in sidewalk counseling outside abortion clinics in Kansas, Missouri, and Illinois, sued Carbondale, arguing that the local law is unconstitutional.
Pro-life groups argue that laws restricting free speech outside abortion clinics deserve to be reexamined in light of the Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade (1973) and held that there was no absolute right to an abortion under the U.S. Constitution.
Because the 2022 ruling meant abortion was no longer considered protected by the Constitution but returned to individual states to decide their own regulations, laws that limit advocacy outside abortion clinics need to be curbed, according to these groups.
In July 2023, U.S. District Judge Stephen McGlynn of the Southern District of Illinois dismissed the lawsuit against Carbondale’s bubble-zone law in a brief two-page ruling. The judge found that the lawsuit was barred by the Supreme Court ruling in Hill v. Colorado (2000).
In Hill v. Colorado, the Supreme Court upheld a Colorado law that forbade activists opposed to abortion from coming within eight feet of another person within a 100-foot zone around a health care facility without that person’s consent. The court ruled that activists who wished to express their opinions were free to do so outside the designated zone.
Peter Breen, executive vice president and head of litigation at the Thomas More Society, a public interest law firm on Coalition Life’s legal team, said it is time for the Supreme Court to overturn the Hill v. Colorado precedent that keeps bubble-zone laws alive.
“Now that the Supreme Court has returned the abortion debate to the people and their legislators, it is more important than ever to restore the free speech rights of those who advocate for life in the public square,” Mr. Breen said in a written statement.
“Hill v. Colorado was egregiously wrong on the day it was decided, and it remains a black mark in our law to this day.”
The new appeal was made after the state of Illinois banned pro-life sidewalk counseling last year. Months later, a federal court invalidated the law.
The state law, known as SB 1909, was “likely classic content and viewpoint discrimination prohibited by the First Amendment,” the judge determined.
On July 16, the Supreme Court directed Carbondale to respond to the petition by Aug. 19.
Jamie Snyder, city attorney for Carbondale, didn’t respond by publication time to a request for comment.
