Jewish family can have anti-hate yard signs after neighbor used slur, court says
A Jewish family had the right to cover their yard with signs denouncing hate and racism after their neighbor hurled an anti-Semitic insult at them during a property dispute a decade ago. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has ruled.
The court ruled that Simon and Toby Galapo exercised their rights under the Pennsylvania Constitution when they placed protest signs on their property and pointed them directly at their neighbors’ homes in the Philadelphia suburbs — a total of 23 signs over a period of years — with messages such as “Hitler Eichmann Racists,” “No Place 4 Racism” and “Woe to the Racists. Woe to the Neighbors.”
“All homeowners will at some point be forced to look at signs they may not like on their neighbor’s property — whether they are signs supporting a political candidate, advocating for a cause, or simply expressing support or disagreement on an issue,” wrote Justice Kevin Dougherty for the court’s 4-2 majority. He said suppressing such displays “would mean the end of residential expression.”
In a disagreementAccording to Judge Kevin Brobson, judges have the authority to “prohibit speech by residents … that rises to the level of a private nuisance and disrupts the quiet enjoyment of the neighbour’s home.”
The neighbors’ ongoing dispute over a property line and “landscape issues” reached a fever pitch in November 2014 when a member of the Oberholtzer family directed an anti-Semitic insult at Simon Galapo, according to court documents. By June of that year, the Galapo family had put up the first of numerous signs aimed at the Oberholtzer property.
The Oberholtzers filed a lawsuit seeking to prohibit their neighbors from posting signs “with false, seditious words, content, innuendo and slander.” They claimed the protest signs were defamatory, portrayed the family in a false light and were a nuisance. One family member, Frederick Oberholzer Jr., testified that he could only see signs from his back windows.
Simon Galapo testified that he wanted to make a statement about anti-Semitism and racism, teach his children to fight against it and change the behavior of his neighbors.
The case was appealed after a Montgomery County judge ruled that the Galapo family could keep their signs but must be banned from Oberholzer’s home.
The majority of the high court said this was an impermissible suppression of free speech. The decision noted that the state Constitution broadly characterizes free speech as an “invaluable right” to speak freely on any subject. While “we do not take lightly concerns … about the right to quiet enjoyment of one’s property,” Dougherty wrote, the Galapo family’s right to free speech was paramount.