8-1 Supreme Court decision in favor of Phelps

Westboro Baptist Church MAY CONTINUE TO PICKET FUNERALS.

I tried to guess ahead of time who the one dissenter might be, but couldn’t decide. It turned out to be Samuel Alito:

Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. dissented in the case, Snyder v. Phelps, No. 09-751. He likened the protest to fighting words, which are not protected by the First Amendment. ‘In order to have a society in which public issues can be openly and vigorously debated,’ he wrote, ‘it is not necessary to allow the brutalization of innocent victims.'”