Buffer zones left in place around abortion clinics

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Thursday left in place laws in Chicago and Pennsylvania that restrict antiabortion protesters who gather near the entrances of clinics and other medical facilities.

The court without comment turned away challengers who said the ordinances violate their First Amendment rights to free speech “at the precise moment when this speech is most likely to matter.”

Justice Clarence Thomas would have granted the challenge to Chicago’s ordinance, but no other justice agreed.

Antiabortion groups wanted the justices to re-examine the court’s 2000 decision in Hill vs. Colorado, in which it approved that state’s law that established a 100-foot buffer zone around the entrances to medical facilities.

Violent clashes sometimes occur between antiabortion protesters and women and their supporters entering clinics.

The challengers said the Supreme Court’s free speech decisions since Hill have undermined the precedent.

For instance, the court in 2014 struck down a Massachusetts law that allowed only certain people in a 35-foot zone around entrances to facilities.

The Chicago law says that within 50 feet of the entrance to an abortion clinic or other medical facility, a person needs consent to come within 8 feet of someone to pass out leaflets or to engage in “oral protest, education or counseling.”

A unanimous panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit reluctantly upheld the Chicago ordinance, saying the court’s subsequent decisions “have deeply shaken Hill’s foundation.”

The Supreme Court also declined to hear a similar Harrisburg, Pa., ordinance.