The D.C. Metropolitan Police Department has banned a pro-life assembly and chalk display during Inauguration Week.

Since 1974, hundreds of pro-lifers have gathered in Washington D.C. memorializing the millions of lives lost as a result of the Supreme Court’s Roe. v. Wade decisions, petitioning Congress for redress as well. This year, the march just happens to coincide with Inauguration Week, giving pro-life organizations a chance to leave messages for the incoming president.

The Christian Defense Coalition and Generation Life and Survivors of the Abortion Holocaust applied for permission to conduct a First-Amendment assembly on the  sidewalk near the White House, with accompanying sidewalk chalk messages. On January 7 they received their reply from D.C. Police Commander Crane, hand delivered to an attorney from the American Center for Law & Justice who represents Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, director of the Christian Defense Coalition, stating that this year, because of a lack of specific details and information, the MPD simply could not fashion a permit for the groups.

The ban clearly targets the pro-life messages that were going to be chalked on the sidewalk in front of the White House on January 24, because for 16 years the District of Columbia has allowed public chalk displays as part of public demonstrations and vigils for many public assemblies.

In addition, the MPD determined the assembly would be a security risk and that the sidewalk chalkings would “constitute defacing public property in violation of D.C. Official Code 22-3312.01,” which he assures the group, is a “content neutral criminal proscription of general application.”

Immediately, Senior Counsel James Henderson, Sr., returned the opening salvo with a letter to Terrence Ryan, general counsel for the MPD, decrying the injustice and illegality of the MPD’s decision, noting that Commander Crane’s decision was based on a D.C. Code related to graffiti and intimidation. In that same letter (scroll down to page three) he also included pictures taken of MPD-sponsored sidewalk chalk contests directly in front of the White House.

Rev. Mahoney has issued his own statement regarding the ban:

Sadly, the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Police Department has chosen to trample and crush the First Amendment by banning clearly protected free speech.

It is most troubling that for the first time ever law enforcement is choosing to ban this practice when it involved a pro-life display taking place in front of the White House. Is this the future of free speech and political dissent under President Barack Obama?

The streets in front of the White House should be open to all views, opinions and thoughts. It should not be a place of censorship or intimidation. I hope this was not the kind of change President Obama was talking about.

Shutting down the public square, denying Americans their right to peaceful assembly, is apparently the order of the new day.

The Christian Defense Coalition plans to file a lawsuit accusing D.C.’s MPD of infringing on First Amendment free speech rights. But as of this posting, the ban still stands.

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StevenErtelt said:

	more more on this at http://www.lifenews.com/nat4729.html
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January 15, 2009 | url
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bobloblaw said:

	... huh, that doesn't sound very pro-choice.
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January 15, 2009
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RichardR369 said:

	Of course it isn't pro-choice. Everything is supposed to be in the liberal's favor in order for it to be 'fair'.
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January 16, 2009
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Peter Steele said:

RE: Admiral Peter Steele, USN [Dec/Ret] is a member of Roy Moore's Ten Commandments My late father was a moral man as he said that the communists and socialists violate the ten commandments to propagate their isms. He said that to the Christian Freedom Foundation on April 28, 1965 after Goldwater lost the election to the socialist LBJ. My father saw that our country would get into deep trouble after WWII. He should have gotten the Nobel Peace Prize for his recommendations in dealing with the communists in his Communist Manifesto: Blueprint for World Revolt which sold 175,000 copies in 1956 and 1970. RADM Peter Steele, USN was a servant of God all his life and a pure capitalist - he's in Heaven right now as part of Judge Roy Moore's Ten Commandments. Peter F. Steele

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January 16, 2009
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xoomac said:

... show up and exercise your 1st Amendment rights to be civilly disobedient. Your God is your sovereign and to whom you owe your first and foremost allegiance when federal govt. becomes fascist by imposing a police state to enforce violations of our constitutional unalienable rights. Don't stand for this outrage and show up enmasse to not only Chalk your right 2 defend the unborn, but 2 expose Obama for the fraud he is. He is NOT even eligible by birth to be Pres. of the U.S. Chalk your disgust and displeasure with his refusal to comply with repeated requests to produce his birth certificate from Hawaii as John McCain cooperated fully when his natural born citizenship was called into question. The lawsuits are on file and have been since August of Last year! What are we waiting 4? This man is a FRAUD! He needs to be exposed and so do the crooks and cronies of the cabal defying We the People 2 do anything about it. Fight for your freedoms or U will lose them all if this man is allowed to take office.

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January 19, 2009
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