Snowflakes in Hell

Steve Lonegan, former Mayor of Bogota, New Jersey, and persistent thorn in the side of Governor Corzine, has just been handed a fantastic lawsuit opportunity under Title 42 USC Section 1983, and I do hope he takes the opportunity for the sake of anyone else exercising their constitutional rights in New Jersey.

Steve Lonegan, the former mayor of Bogota who is an outspoken critic of tax and immigration policies, was arrested Saturday afternoon outside a South Jersey high school while protesting Governor Corzine’s toll-hike plan.

Lonegan said in a telephone interview that he was handcuffed while handing out pamphlets a few minutes before the 2 p.m. start of Corzine’s town meeting in Cape May County. Corzine is holding the public events in each of the state’s 21 counties to try to sell his financial proposal.

Arrested outside a public event, on public property, and while peacefully demonstrating would seem to be to be a proper exercise of first amendment rights.

Paul Porreca, a retired Superior Court judge who served in Cape May County and is a member of Lonegan’s group, said he witnessed a verbal altercation between Lonegan, police and a school board administrator over the right of protesters to display placards outside the Middle Township High School. The unidentified administrator claimed the site was not public property and that school board policy prohibited protesting, Porreca said.

Police arrested Lonegan when he refused to get rid of his sign or clear off the property, Porreca said.

Porreca later said “I think it was outrageous. It was a clear abuse of our constitutional rights, our right to assembly, the people’s right to free speech. They were intimidated and, though they were not physically abused, certainly their sensibilities were abused.” I agree.

UPDATE: Not being a first amendment expert, I e-mailed Eugene Volokh to see if he knew whether the state has a case here.  He pointed me to U.S. v. Kokinda.  That case suggests it would depend on the nature of the property they were arrested on.  If it was a public sidewalk outside of the high school, that would be a traditional public forum, where they would be free to protest.  A sidewalk owned by the school, leading up to the school, would be a non-public forum, where the school district would be in its right to enforce a blanket prohibition on protesting.

It’s disappointing, but Fred’s third place finish doesn’t bode well for the future of his campaign.   Nonetheless, Fred gained at Huckabee’s expense, and pulled away some evangelical vote, he might just be a spoiler for Huckabee, which means I surely hope he’ll stay in the race and keep fighting.  I had sincerely hoped Fred’s campaign could do much better in South Carolina than in previous states, but I don’t think it’s there for him this year.  I sincerely hope whoever walks away with the nomination will consider Fred for his Vice Presidential running mate, especially McCain, who is old as dirt and likely to die in office.