Claiming there is a difference between "content and viewpoint discrimination," the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals today issued a ruling against Choose Life license plates in Illinois.  The court effectively ruled that content discrimination is not a First Amendment violation because the state can choose to exclude the "entire subject of abortion."  In their view, prohibited viewpoint discrimination would only occur if one side of the subject was allowed, but not the other.

This ruling appears to be inconsistent with the rulings from other Federal appellate courts that required the issuance of Choose Life specialty plates when states rejected them based on message content, finding such actions to be viewpoint discrimination.  Most recently in October 2008, appeal of a Ninth Circuit ruling was rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court.   This Ninth Circuit ruling recognized exclusion of one subject, when other subjects were allowed, as viewpoint discrimination.  

Judge Richard Tallman wrote for the appellate court in its January 2008 ruling that the Arizona commission "clearly denied the application based on the nature of the message,” indicating discrimination based on the Pro-Life perspective of the plate sponsors.  The concept of rejecting the "entire subject of abortion" was proposed by the state of Arizona, but rejected by the court.

Apparently, none of this precedent made any difference to the Seventh Circuit judicial panel.  This is the same Circuit Court that effectively ignored an 8-1 Supreme Court decision in favor of Joseph Scheidler in the NOW v. Scheidler case.    Scheidler needed to return to the Supreme Court to get an 8-0 ruling in his favor before the Seventh Circuit was willing to reverse the ruling against Scheidler, as clearly directed by the Supreme Court.  Here we go again!

William Beckman
Executive Director
Illinois Right to Life Committee
65 E. Wacker Place, Suite 800
Chicago, IL 60601
312-422-9300
beckman@illinoisrighttolife.org
www.illinoisrighttolife.org

 

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Illinois Right to Life Committee, founded in 1968, is the oldest Pro-Life educational organization in Illinois.