Time to Expose the Abortion Distortion : Pro-lifers have no rights, even under the First Amendment.

Someday soon, this column might be illegal.

When it comes to certain issues, the First Amendment’s free-expression guarantees are in such jeopardy that it’s conceivable a newspaper commentary like this might actually be considered subversive or criminal and the author might face harsh government sanctions for committing such ideas to print.

Impossible in America, you say? Maybe. But when it comes to abortion, the American media and criminal-justice system have developed such a glaring double standard that they both tolerate otherwise unimaginable constitutional infringement. Call it the abortion distortion. And here’s the latest horror story.

In 1989, the Feminist Women’s Health Center in Sacramento obtained a temporary restraining order prohibiting five peaceful pro-life sidewalk counselors (not “rescuers” or practitioners of civil disobedience) from picketing, distributing literature or talking to women seeking abortions within specified boundaries around the clinic.

Two trials tested the order. In the second, Judge James Long ordered the five anti-abortion activists--ordinary working people, mind you--to pay the abortion clinic’s attorney nearly $100,000. Last month, in a split decision, the California Court of Appeal affirmed that order, leaving at least some of the five defendants considering the prospect of bankruptcy or even jail as punishment for exercising their First Amendment rights.

Keep in mind, all the five were accused of was violating a constitutionally questionable order restricting their right to peaceably assemble in front of a clinic and express their heartfelt convictions about abortion. Even one of the three appeal judges questioned the propriety of the heavy fine, calling the defendants “people of very modest resources.” In his dissent, Judge Robert K. Puglia wrote that the assessment would “stifle the exercise of First Amendment rights not only for the defendants, but all others who in the future will forswear their rights because they cannot afford financial penalties.

“This is, after all, the United States of America, and not the ‘Evil Empire,’ ” Puglia wrote. Well, maybe.

If pro-life activists don’t have the right to stand in front of abortion clinics quietly picketing and distributing literature to potential clients, what are their rights? How are they supposed to express their sentiments? What is an appropriate form of protest? And if, indeed, peaceful, nonviolent, law-abiding abortion opponents can be muzzled, who’s next?

Let’s imagine, for instance, that instead of a taxpayer-subsidized abortion clinic, the five were peacefully picketing a chemical plant they believed was polluting the environment. Is there any doubt that the nation’s top editorialists would be rushing to bring such a travesty of justice to light? Why, you might even expect to see Hollywood make a movie of the week about such heroes. And it is extremely doubtful that such an unconscionable restraining order on politically protected speech would stand for very long. Would the American Civil Liberties Union have allowed such a case to drag on for four years without intervening?

But we’re not talking about a fashionable, trendy, politically correct protest. And few in the elite circles of the judicial system or the media have any sympathy, compassion or use for pro-lifers. In other words, the nature of their cause and the content of their speech makes all the difference. That’s the abortion distortion.

The pro-life movement in this country has been remarkably patient and restrained in the face of such hideous injustice and hypocrisy. First, in 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court stripped away virtually any legislative recourse for abortion opponents. In effect, Roe vs. Wade ordained that the streets would be the only battleground left to those who opposed legalized abortion on demand. Then, in recent years, some courts have tried to usurp even that modest forum.

Where are anti-abortion forces supposed to turn? When ordinary forms of protest are judged criminal and discouraged with staggering fines, is it surprising that more abortion opponents have turned to unlawful civil disobedience? Is it any wonder that a few have even turned violent?

By systematically eliminating the means by which pro-lifers can make their voices heard peacefully and legally, the government, the courts and ideologically blinded media have created a political and social climate conducive only to chaos and fanaticism.