With Veterans Day just passed, I hope we can take a moment to reflect on the sacrifices of the nearly 3 million men and women in the active and reserve branches of our military. Ripped from their families and placed in faraway minefields and barren deserts, they are some of our truest heroes.

But I am disheartened by the activities of one Kansas man and his congregation, who seek to undermine the services such men have so unselfishly rendered for the American cause. And while I don’t intend to play into their hands and give them more media coverage, I do believe that our society must rise up in a collective voice and proclaim, “No more!”

For the past six years or so, “Pastor” Fred Phelps and his Westboro Baptist Church have traveled around the country to the funerals of fallen military personnel with picket signs reading such obscenities as “Thank God for Dead Soldiers,” reflecting their belief that God is killing Americans in Iraq because of our “tolerance” for homosexuality. But let’s give Phelps his due and also point out his immense intolerance for everything from the Quran to Jews.

While Phelps’s abomination of a church has been actively protesting 99 percent of the world for more than 15 years, this may all come to an end shortly. A Baltimore jury recently ruled against Westboro and awarded the family of Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder $10.9 million in damages after the Phelps gang protested at the 20-year-old’s funeral. If the verdict is upheld, it could effectively bankrupt Westboro and greatly diminish its horrific activities.

The question now moves into a constitutional realm, as appellate courts, and perhaps even the Supreme Court, will weigh in on its First Amendment implications and the right of free speech.

I don’t mean to wax academic about legal theory, but I believe this scenario presents us with an unprecedented chance to further elucidate the boundaries of intolerable utterance. The First Amendment states that “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech,” a notion which has been clarified since its 18th-century creation. We can’t yell “fire” in a crowded theatre, and we can’t intentionally incite others to the violent overthrow of the government, among dozens of other limitations — be they symbolic, literary or tangible.

Given that certain instances of speech are ripe for abridgement, why then can we not make the same exception for the Westboro bunch? Congress has already passed the Respect for America’s Fallen Heroes Act, which prohibits protests within 300 feet of cemeteries overseen by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs from an hour before to an hour after a funeral. Additionally, several states have taken similar steps to protect soldiers and their families from the horror of having to watch their son or daughter interred with homophobic rants echoing in the background. I applaud these efforts heartily, despite the potential circumvention of perceived First Amendment protections.

Indeed, we may be climbing a slippery slope when we prohibit a certain kind of speech just because the majority of society tends to disagree with it. A Nov. 12 Los Angeles Times editorial put it this way: “Those on society’s margins — and sometimes its weirdos — are those whose speech needs protecting.”

I tend, however, to disagree with this stance of absolute protection. Yes, it may seem odd that someone whose opinion appears in a newspaper would advocate restriction on free speech, but we must draw the line in the sand somewhere. When Phelps, given his malicious intent, is allowed to make such hateful remarks, he is violating the privacy rights of the grieving family and causing severe emotional distress — at least that’s what the Baltimore jury found. Our legislators are supposed to create laws that promote a decent and civil society, and if they fail to recognize that a funeral, much like an in-chamber Congressional session, is off-limits to protesters, then they have failed to recognize the intention of our Constitution.

We have come to a crossroads of our legislative destiny: the rights of decency and privacy versus those of absolute liberty and free speech. Many judicial scholars have advocated for a “marketplace of ideas,” which they claim is catalyzed by the right to free speech. But need we tolerate a marketplace in which we allow the Phelpses, David Dukes and neo-Nazis of the world to march triumphant? There is room in America for controversy and debate, but allowing speech that critically belies other constitutional rights shows contempt for our Constitution. We must recognize that simply because the right to free speech is protected in the First Amendment doesn’t give it priority or preponderance against its 26 brethren.

Phelps is a monster, and we have allowed him to degrade our society for far too long. As we look back on Veterans Day and its implications, we owe it to our current servicemen and women and the 23.5 million living veterans, not to mention the scores of other people he has debased, to end his ignominious activity.

Justice Holmes once said, “We should be eternally vigilant against attempts to check the expression of opinions that we loathe,” but he forgot that we should also do our utmost to protect the rights of those whom we respect and revere.

Neil St. Clair, a senior in the College of Communication and College of Arts and Sciences, is a weekly columnist for The Daily Free Press.He can be reached at [email protected].