Gabriel Olivier likes to share his Christian faith and was doing so near an amphitheater in Brandon, Mississippi, when the local chief of police confronted him with a newly enacted ordinance forbidding “protests” outside designated zones. After being shown the approved location, Gabriel realized it was a remote and isolated space. He returned to his original spot and was charged with a violation and fined. He challenged the law under the First and Fourteenth Amendments, lost at the district court level under the Heck v. Humphrey doctrine, and lost again at the Fifth Circuit, creating a deep split with the Ninth and Tenth Circuits, which do not apply the Heck reasoning for relief in the same way as the Fifth Circuit did.
Preaching, especially when unpopular, has been a bedrock feature of the First Amendment in action. Renaming the activity as a “protest” does not magically transform religious speech into something else that the government can burden by picking conveniently isolated areas where such speech is out of sight and out of earshot.
CLS’ Center for Law & Religious Freedom filed an amicus brief in September urging the U.S. Supreme Court to grant certiorari in this important case.
