The Supreme Court ruled 8-1 in favor of Westboro Baptist Church in Snyder v. Phelps, upholding their right to peacefully picket military funerals with offensive signs under the First Amendment. The case involved a lawsuit by Albert Snyder against Westboro for picketing his son's funeral with signs containing messages like "Thank God for Dead Soldiers". While recognizing the distress caused to Snyder, the Court found that Westboro's speech addressed public issues and did not disrupt the funeral, and was therefore protected. Only Justice Alito dissented, arguing the picketing constituted brutalization beyond the scope of free speech protections.

1. Argumentative or persuasive essay about First amendment protection.
Read article and instruction which are attached.This is 5 full page argumentative or
persuasive essay.This essay has to be write about people who are in the article have to
protected by first amendment.clear thesis, relevant reason, and sufficient evidence
needs.ESSAY ASSIGNMENT: hwrite the essay you wrote in class on the Synder v Phelpslegal
case. You may keep the same basic thesis and reasons you used in the in-classversion, or
you may choose to completely change sides in the case or develop yourthesis with
completely different reasons. In any case, as an out of class essay. thisversion should be
much more developed and polished than the in-class version.Document all the information
or ideas you take from any outside sources – includinginformation taken from the original
article – following the MLA conventions fordocumenting sources.Snyder v. PhelpsSnyder v.
Phelpswas a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held thatspeech on a
public Sidewalk. about a public issue. deserves 15? amendment protection.even if the
speech is found to be ?outrageous.” The issue was whether the First Amendment protected
the public protestors at a funeralagainst tort liability. It involved a claim of intentional
infliction of emotional distress madeby Albert Snyder, a gay man and the father of Matthew
Snyder, a Marine who died inthe Iraq War. The claim was made against the Phelps family.
including Fred Phelps.and against Phelps’ Westboro Baptist Church (WBC). The Court
ruled in favor of Phelpsin an 8-1 decision, holding that their speech related to a public issue,
and wasdisseminated on a public sidewalk.BackgroundOn March 3. 2006. US. Marine Lance
Corporal Matthew A. Snyder was killed in a non-combat-related vehicle accident in Iraq. On
March 10. Westboro Baptist Church (WBC)picketed Snyder’ s funeral in Westminster.
Maryland. as it had done at thousands ofother funerals throughout the US. in protest of
what they considered America’ sincreasing tolerance of homosexuality. Picketers displayed
placards such as “ America isdoomed,” “ You’ re going to hell.” “ God hates you.” “ Fag
troops.” “ Semper fi fags.” and?Thank God for dead soldlers.” WBC published statements
on its website thatdenounced Albert Snyder and his ex-wife for raising their son Catholic.
stating theytaught Matthew to defy his creator,” “ raised him for the devil.” and “ taught
him that Godwas a liar.” Albert Snyder. Matthew Snyder’ s father. sued Fred Phelps.
Westboro Baptist Churchand two of Phelps’ s daughters, Rebekah Phelps-Davis and Shirley
Phelps-Roper.for defamation. intrusion upon seclusion. publicity given to private life.
intentionalinfliction of emotional distress and civil conspiracy. The claim of defamation

2. arismg f3mcomments posted about Snyder on the WBC website was dismissed, on the
grounGSthat the contents were “ essentially Phelps-Roper’ s religious opinion and would
notrealistically tend to expose the Plaintiff to public hatred or scorn” . The claim of
publicity-given to private life was similarly dismissed since no private information was
madepublic by the Defendants: they learned that Snyder was divorced and his son
wasCatholic from his son’ s newspaper obituary. The case proceeded to trial on
theremaining three counts.The facts of the case were essentially undisputed at trial. Albert
Snyder testified that?they turned this funeral into a media circus and they wanted to hurt
my family. Theywanted their message heard and they didn’ t care who they Stepped over
My son shouidhave been buried with dignity. not with a bunch of clowns outside.” Snyder
described his emotional injuries, including becoming tearful, angry. andphysically
nauseated to the point that he would vomit He stated that the Defendantshad placed a
“ bug” in his head, so that he was unable to think of his son withoutthinking of their actions,
adding, “ I want so badly to remember all the good stuff and sofar, I remember the good
stuff, but it always turns into the bad.” Snyder called severalexpert witnesses who testified
that worsening of his diabetes andsevere depression had resulted from the Defendants’
activities.In their defense, WBC established that they had complied with all local ordinances
andhad obeyed police instructions. The picket was held in a location cordOned off by
thepolice, approximately 1000 feet from the church, from which it could be neither seen
norheard. Mr. Snyder testified that, although he glimpsed the tops of the signs from
thefuneral procession, he did not see their content until he watched a news program
ontelevision later that day. He also indicated that he had found the W805 statementsabout
his son on their webpage from a Google search.In his instructions to the jury, Judge Richard
D. Bennett for the United States DistrictCourt for the District of Maryland stated that the
First Amendment protection of freespeech has limits, including vulgar, offensive and
shocking statements, and that the jun,must decide “ whether the defendant’ s actions would
be highly offensive to a reasonableperson, whether they, were extreme and outrageous and
whether these actions were sooffensive and shocking as to not be entitled to First
Amendment protection.? WBCunsuccessfully sought a mistrial based on alleged prejudicial
statements made by thejudge and violations of the gag order by the plaintiff?s attorney. An
appeal was alsosought by the WBC.On October 31, 2007, the jury found for the Plaintiff and
awarded Snyder $2.9 million incompensatory damages, later adding a decision to award $6
million in punitivedamages for invasion of privacy and an additional $2 million for causing
emotionaldistress (a total of $10.9 million). The Phelpses said that despite the verdict, the
churchwould continue to picket military funerals. On February 4, 2008, Bennett upheld
theverdict but reduced the punitive damages from $8 million to $2.1 million, to take
intoconsideration the resources of WBC. The total judgment then stood at $5 million.ensure
that 5:22:51:ng anetgt?gigbwldings and Phelps’ s law office in an attempt
tofigsepap’ ::llel::[s?;%fihtga: hearddon September 24, 2009. The Fourth Circuit Coun ofThe
Fourth Circurt rU’ Ejdryhverthict and set asnde the lower court’ s $5 million
judgment.question of lawrather tha af e lower court had erred by instructing thejury to
deCide aprotected by the First A it get (speCificaIly, whether or not the speech in question
wasWBC?s website were men ment). it also ruled that the protest signs and language

3. onrhetorical hyperbole and figurative expressron, rather thanassertions of fact, so they
were a form of protected speech. On March 30, 2010, theCourt further ordered Albert
Snyder to pay the court costs for the defendants, anamount totaling $16,510. People all over
the country, including political commentator Bill0 Reilly, agreed to cover the costs, pending
appeal. O’ Reilly also pledged to support allof Snyder?s future court costs against the
Phelps.The Court’ s DecisionChief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion.In an 8-1
decision, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Phelps, upholding the FourthCircuit’ s
decision. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion stating “ WhatWestboro
said, in the whole context of how and where it chose to say it, is entitled tospecial
protection’ under the First Amendment and that protection cannot be overcomeby a jury
finding that the picketing was outrageous.” The court’ s opinion also stated that the
memorial service was not disturbed, saying,Westboro stayed well away from the memorial
service, Snyder could see no more thanthe tOps of the picketers’ signs, and there is no
indication that the picketing interferedwith the funeral service itself.” The decision also
declined to expand the “ captiveaudience doctrine,” saying that Snyder was not in a state
where he was coerced to hearthe negative speechJustice Stephen Breyer wrote a concurring
opinion, emphasizing his view that thedecision related only to picketing, and did not take
into consideration Westboro BaptistChurch’ s on-line publications that attacked the Snyder
family.Justice Samuel Alito was the lone dissenting justice in this case, beginning his
dissentwith, “ Our profound national commitment to free and open debate is not a license
for thevicious verbal fisault that occurred in this case.” He concluded, “ in order to have
asociety in which public issues can be openly and vigorously debated, it is not necessaryto
allow the brutalization of innocent victims like petitioner.” In a July 2011 speech, Justice
Ginsburg called Alito’ s dissent “ hearfiejfl: and said that itunderscored the incomparable
distress suffered by the Snyder family,” noting thatalthough no member of the Courtjoined
him, his opinion aligned with the views ofmany Court-watchers, including one of the
nation’ s newest-retired Justice Stevens,[who] recently told the Federal Bar Council he
‘ would have joined [Justice Alito?s]powerful dissent?.”