News-Record.com

Update: Click here to read the story online.

I’m writing a story for Wednesday’s paper about Senate Bill 1833, which would prohibit protests at military funerals.

The story is timely for a couple reasons. First, a related measure, which would authorize the General Assembly to hear the protest buffer bill, is on the Senate calendar for Wednesday.

As well, members of the group that prompted the bill are in Greensboro protesting at the Southern Baptist Convention.

If you don’t know about Fred Phelps and Westboro Baptist Church (WBC) of Topeka, Kansas, you could follow this link, but be prepared for some pretty hateful language.

If you’d rather spare yourself, the bullet is this: these folks think that the root of all that’s wrong with the world can be traced to gay people and what they see as the United State’s overly-tolerant attitude toward homosexuality. To make their point, they hold rather ugly protests at military funerals. (They’re protesting the Southern Baptist Convention because officials there are honoring the Rev. Billy Graham . Phelps says Graham is too lenient toward gay people.)

The U.S. Congress has already passed a law limiting such protests at national cemeteries. The state law follows the federal model pretty closely, except would apply to military funerals anywhere in the state.

Frankly, I would be surprised if the North Carolina law ran into much by way of opposition. There will be some folks who swallow hard at the notion of limiting what amounts to political protest. But others in the know (read: people with law degrees) have told me that the proposed law is pretty narrowly drawn, especially when compared with some other state laws that may have over-reached.

And there seems to be pretty broad agreement, at least among Senators here, that the sort of thing that Phelps does is reprehensible. The hope is that the new law addresses a singular case and won’t apply to many, if any, other advocates.