Court Reverses Injunction Against Anti-Anti-Semitic Speech Targeted at Neighbor
[A.] From today’s Pennsylvania Supreme Court majority opinion in Oberholzer v. Galapo, written by Justice Kevin Dougherty, joined by Chief Justice Debra Todd and Justices Christine Donohue and Sallie Updyke Mundy:
Dr. Simon and Toby Galapo (appellants) own a home in Abington Township, Montgomery County, the rear yard of which borders the property of Frederick and Denise Oberholzer (appellees). Although the properties are separated by a creek, low-lying shrubs, and some tall trees, the houses and yards remain visible to one another. In November 2014, a brewing feud between the neighbors over landscaping issues reached a boiling point after Dr. Galapo confronted Mr. Oberholzer about a resurveyed property line and Mrs. Oberholzer responded by calling him a “fucking Jew.”
This prompted the Galapos in June 2015 to erect the first of many signs primarily displaying anti-hate and anti-racist messages “along the back tree-line directly abutting [the Oberholzers’] property line, pointed directly at [the Oberholzers’] house, and in direct sight of [other] neighbors’ houses.” All told, the Galapos posted twenty-three signs over a years-long span, during which the neighbors continued to quarrel over other minor nuisances….
The signs included, among others, “No Place 4 Racism,” “Hitler Eichmann Racists,” “Racists: the true enemies of FREEDOM,” and twenty more. The Oberholzers sued, claiming the Galapos’ posting of the signs constituted “(1) private nuisance; (2) intrusion upon seclusion; (3) defamation – libel and slander; (4) publicly placing the Oberholzers in false light; and (5) intentional infliction of emotional distress.” The trial court ordered the Galapos to move or reorient the signs so that they “be positioned in such a way that they do not directly face and target [the Oberholzers’] property: the fronts of the signs (lettering, etc.) are not to be visible to [the Oberholzers] nor face in the direction of [their] home.”
Today, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court held the injunction violated the Pennsylvania Constitution’s free speech clause. The Court applied its 1978 precedent in Willing v. Mazzacone, which generally suggested that injunctions against speech (in that case, against libel) are unconstitutional prior restraint, and held that it applied to this situation as well. Recent court decisions throughout the country have mostly concluded that the federal First Amendment doesn’t prohibit permanent injunctions against speech found to be constitutionally unprotected, for instance because it is libelous. But state courts are entitled to read their state constitutions as more speech-protective than the federal Constitution. A few excerpts from the 57-page opinion:
[1.]
The fact that one purpose of the Galapos’ signs was to engage in a “personal protest” against the Oberholzers does not alter this conclusion [that the speech cannot be enjoined]…. Article I, Section 7 [of the Pennsylvania Constitution] “specifically affirms the ‘invaluable right’ to the free
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