Pastor Fred Phelps should have the right to picket funerals.

I will use this round to extend my case. Remember that it is the burden of the pro to prove that the Phelps picketing funerals is not illegal in any way. Contention 1A: First Amendment I will defend this point by refuting my opponent's responses. Contention 1B: Peaceful Assembly My opponent defines "peaceful assembly" as assembly where nobody is "physically hurt". However, disturbing the "peaceful assembly" at a funeral is much more than physical pain; it's emotional distress. The definition of peace, according to the New Oxford American Dictionary, is "freedom from disturbance". Imagine that you are trying to study "in peace", but your neighbor is blasting loud music. This is "disturbing the peace", and is thus likened to picketing at a funeral. One attends a funeral to honor the dead "in peace" – not to read hate speech on the signs of protesters as to why their child will burn in hell. My opponent will try to respond to this by saying that under this definition, any unintended disturbance should be rendered illegal. However, I will pre-empt his response by stating that only an intended disturbance is illegal. Thus, because the Phelpses protests intentionally disrupt peaceful assembly, the pickets are illegal. Contention 1C: A Clear and Present Danger My opponent's response makes no sense. He states that "If there is no law explicitly stating this, it can't be illegal" and that the Supreme Court must interpret the Constitution. Well, the Supreme Court ruled in 1919 that ‘if the words are used in such circumstances and of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substansive evils that Congress has a right to prevent." Christopher McKinney of The Retriver Weekly compares funeral picketing "to yelling ‘fire' in a movie theater; doing so inspires chaos and panic, and innocent people can be injured or even killed." It's clear that the "words used" by Phelps – such as "God Hates America", "God Hates F@gs", "Pope in Hell", etc – are meant to do naught but cause chaos and anger, and thus are a "clear and present danger" and are illegal. Contention 2: Invasion of Privacy I find it funny that my opponent tries to prove that Phelps does not intrude on funeral processions, as that is exactly what the Phelps aim to do with their protests. The Phelps break the law in two ways. 1), they intrude "on one's solitude and into one's private affairs." The Phelps are clearly uninvited to these funerals and attend for the sole purpose of invading the family's privacy. There is no refuting this point; if they intended to "protest peacefully", they would do so from Westboro County in Kentucky. By flying out to funerals nationwide, (they picket one funeral every day, and have done so for a decade), it's clear that their sole intent is to invade the privacy of these families. 2) Second, they invade the privacy of these families by giving them "publicity which puts him/her in a false light to the public". The Phelps try to achieve this with their posters filled with hate speech about why the children of these families will go to hell. Contention 3: Hate Speech The case of Matthew Shephard, a 21-year-old student from the University of Wyoming who was beaten, tied to a fence, and killed, for being gay, is touted as a prime example of hate crime in the United States. We must remember that hate crimes don't need to be physical; hate speech is a type of hate crime. Just this past month, two students on the east coast committed suicide due to hate speech. My opponent responds to this by stating that First Amendment forbids the restriction of speech; simply put, that is false, because any speech "which disparages a person or a group on the basis of some characteristic such as race or sexual orientation" is regarded as hate speech and is illegal. Contention 4: Harassment My opponent states that harassment is actions that ""exhaust by attacking repeatedly". He naively states that Phelps is "not directly 'attacking' these soldiers". I have numerous responses to this. 1)My opponent clearly hasn't done his homework. The Phelps have picketed a funeral or staged a protest once a day for almost a decade. This is a PERFECT example of "exhaust by attacking repeatedly." 2)The Phelps are definitely "directly attacking" these soldiers. They go to their FUNERALS in order to do so. Like Tod Robberson of Dallas News stated, "If Phelps were standing in his Westboro Baptist Church yelling "God hates f*gs" at the top of his lungs, I would defend his right to do so." However, Phelps is going to funerals DIRECTLY to attack the families of soldiers. 3)Finally, these pickets should be illegal for one more reason; they don't even target the correct group. In the case of Snyder v. Phelps, Lance Snyder was a soldier who died in Iraq whose funeral was picketed by the Phelps. But Lance was not gay. The Phelps believe that since the US is tolerant towards gays, God punishes the US by killing our soldiers, thus making it the Phelps's duty to picket the funerals of dead soldiers. Do soldiers who died in the line of duty to protect American citizens – like the Phelps – deserve such a dishonorable funeral? Not only are the Phelps "directly attacking" by picketing funerals, they are directly attacking the WRONG people, thus making their actions ever more illegal. The Phelps violate the First Amendment by disturbing peaceful assembly. They are a "clear and present danger" whenever they protest, and it's only a matter of time before violence arises from their protests. They invade the privacy of grieving families, and disturb the peace in the local towns. They use illicit hate speech to spread their message. Finally, they harass these grieving families, by "repeatedly" protesting funerals around the United States on a daily basis. When it's clear that so many laws have been violated by the actions of the Phelps, I can only see a con vote in this debate.