Last week, a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals threw out a $109 million verdict against anti-abortion activists.

The defendants operate a website called The Nuremberg Files, which presents data on abortionists, using a wanted poster format. The plaintiffs alleged that posting personal information on these doctors violated their privacy, and might even incite someone to harm them.

Of course, the plaintiffs never really had a chance, thanks to a precedent from the Civil Rights era--NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co., 458 U.S. 886, 921 (1982). This case centered around the boycott of a store in Mississippi by local Black residents. The organizers of the boycott needed full compliance if it were to succeed, and directed strong actions against those who wouldn't comply, including publicizing their names, and even threatening them with physical violence. In a few cases, these threats were actually carried out.

The Court ruled in favor of free speech, contending that unless the threats were immediately accompanied by violence, the speech was protected.

No doubt, the abortionists will be embarrassed by the revelation of their personal information on the Internet, but this is hardly a compelling reason to cancel the First Amendment. Should the National Enquirer have been prevented from publishing pictures of Suzanne Somers leaving a liposuction clinic? Surely, it WAS embarrassing for the fitness guru, and forced her to go public with the real reason she was there: to get cosmetic surgery on a breast damaged by cancer surgery.

Set loose from the prison of political correctness, free speech can be challenging. Remember the Declaration of Independence? If anything, what this country needs now is a whole lot less sensitivity, and whole lot more virile plain speaking.

As it is, an unintended benefit of the website is consumer protection. A woman considering abortion would be advised to read the bios on these doctors, as a substantial number of them have rotten records that include numerous malpractice lawsuits, and even deaths. Perhaps the elite media should have done a better job informing the public that the best and brightest physicians don't become abortionists.

Unfortunately, Roe v. Wade merely allowed the back alley crowd to move to better digs. Similarly, operating under the dictates of consumer protection laws, the credit card vultures charge interest rates that would make a Mafia loan shark blush, by simply divulging the information beforehand. Do we need to be reminded that "legal" doesn't necessarily equal right or just?

The irony of a precedent favoring a liberal cause being used now to advance a conservative one is obvious enough, but it also demonstrates, once again, that everyone benefits from free speech. Strangely enough, this little lesson is still lost on the elite media, who have all failed to publish the URL of the Nuremberg Files website.

We should not overlook the timing of this decision, coming as it did near the middle of the season of Lent. Catholics, long active in fighting abortion-on-demand, are called during Lent to perform works of charity, prayer, and fasting. If it helps us to note small triumphs, such as this one, along the way, so much the better.

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