The pro-life protest against Planned Parenthood Aurora was scheduled for Saturday, August 25, at 9:00a.
But to ensure that constitutional freedom, Pro-Life Action League had to file a federal lawsuit against the City of Aurora and only got an emergency hearing Friday at 4:00p.
I spoke with PLAL’s attorney, Tom Brejcha of Chicago’s Thomas More Law Center, this morning.
Tom said they filed the lawsuit against Aurora ordinances that are clearly unconstitutional and subjectively enforced. There are two contentions….

The first contention is for “sign suppression.” Police officers have been telling pro-lifers who were picketing and praying at the mill their signs had to remain mobile, not staked in the ground, not leaning against a tree, but constantly moving. Officers were removing the little staked crosses and even told a pro-lifer in a wheelchair he had to hoist his huge graphic sign and move it along.
Yet Eric Scheidler of PLAL took pictures of union, commercial, and political signs in Aurora certainly not in motion.
The second contention is against Aurora’s ordinance stating whenever more than 100 people assemble, the group must have a permit. PLAL’s lawsuit asked how could a count be anticipated for a gathering such as Saturday’s?
PLAL and Tom have such chutzpah. They crack me up. Tom explained the sequence of events leading up to the federal lawsuit filing:

I had called the police commander three times with no call back. So Eric and I went to see him. He wouldn’t take our visit. He said he’d call us after speaking with the city attorney.
Who was that, we asked?
Alayne Weingartz. So Eric and I went to visit her.
We explained the sign ordinance allows exceptions for signs conveying political and personal expression.

Ms. Weingartz said she didn’t know that our signs fell into the political exception.
I said, “You’ve got to be kidding. This is the most divisive political and social issue in the country.”
I asked, “What about personal expression?” She had no answer.
As for the freedom of expression, Ms. Weingartz said, “There have been a lot of complaints about your people and what they’re doing.”
I said, “That’s the very purpose of free speech – to invite dispute and to have profound, unsettling effects on people. That’s the way you open a dialogue.”
She said she would call me back, but she didn’t either.
So I sued them.

In court, the other side only agreed they would not enforce the permit and would not require people to carry signs. Signs could be put on the ground.
“But they didn’t agree to any more than Saturday,” said Tom, “So it’s a live lawsuit and we will prosecute with vigor.”
Tom said the ordinances are blatant violations of the 1st and 14th Amendments to the Constitution, allowing for subjective enforcement and viewpoint discrimination.
[Photos of various signs in Aurora courtesy of Eric Scheidler]