Calling on the County of Fairfax’s Board of Supervisors to protect its citizens’ First Amendment right to peaceable assembly, John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute, is cautioning county officials against enacting a zoning regulation amendment that would significantly restrict the ability of residents to assemble in their homes in order to allegedly pacify a few residents complaining about noise and parking. “The First Amendment does not permit governments to outlaw established freedoms such as free speech, religious exercise and the right to assemble in groups simply because it may be ‘annoying’ to some members of the community,” said constitutional attorney John W. Whitehead, author of A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State. “This is a dangerous road to embark on, one that leads to more onerous regulations such as residential surveillance cameras to monitor how many people are coming and going from one’s home at any given time, criminal charges, and even—as one of The Rutherford Institute’s clients can personally attest to—jail time for daring to hold Bible studies in one’s home.”
Posted on: Wed, 07 May 2014 23:41:27 +0000
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