Marcavage at the Liberty Bell

Michael Marcavage issued a press release on 7 January, 2008: "Liberty on Trial Again in Philadelphia"ⁱ which reported upon another encounter with police. It seems that Pennsylvania authorities, mindless of their civil foundations and laws yet on the books, are continuing to harass gospel preachers - purely and simply stated.

We recounted Kutztown University President Cevallos's call for the arrest of the Christian preachers on 18 April, 2007. On August 20, 2007, we posted a blog about "'Diversity' Propaganda," which reported on law enforcement training in arresting preachers by conditioning the officers to view preachers in a disfavorable light. The cost of this "diversity" and "sensitivity" training is defrayed by grant money supplied by the Home Land Security Department.ⁱⁱ The specifically offensive government action is this:

The training given to the campus police involves role-playing by which a policeman plays the role of a homosexual who is being harassed by "intolerant bigots" - Christians. In this fashion he can learn how to be sensitive to the abused group and to be more understanding of the need to arrest the "hater." Repent America was named as "hot group," a cause of conflict, which the university might need to remove to keep the peace.ⁱⁱⁱ

It is in Philadelphia the same bigotry expressed against Christians by the police that was observed in Kutztown University. Do they have the same trainers in "diversity" and "tolerance"?

Here is what happened according to the Repent America press release: "While preaching against America's toleration of abortion and on repentance from sin to those waiting in line at the Liberty Bell Center, Marcavage was arrested on the public sidewalk just outside the building that houses the bell."

The effort to suppress the speech of Gospel preachers has become quite sophisticated. As the press release indicated, the supervising ranger of Independence National Historical Park, Alan Saperstein, "repeatedly approached Marcavage to demand that he and the ministry team move to a ‘free speech zone' on the other side of the Liberty Bell Center, which was nowhere near those entering or exiting."

By this police order the speaker was being denied public access to the very audience whom he had come to address in the public square. This would not fly in court, ostensibly, so the legal maneuver taken by the ranger (under someone's obviously strategic guidance) was to extend a false authority over the speaker in order to regulate him. A temporary "verbal permit" was offered to the speaker for that day only with the claim that thereafter a written permit would be required before resuming such speech outside the Liberty Bell in Independence National Historical Park. The strategy was apparently designed to induce the voluntary surrender of fundamental speech rights. And as such it was really nothing less than a naked assault upon those sacred rights.

We can speculate why this is. Liberals loathe anti-sodomy and -abortion speech as much or more than Clinton loathed the military. Our free speech laws and principles are difficult even for the more ardent suppressor of the Gospel to quench. Moreover, those in law enforcement tend to be the more conservative and true Constitutionally minded people in contrast to the Leftist who wants to advance his concept of "liberty (to fornicate and sodomize) for all" even above the bigot's right to contrary free speech. So these officers need to be conditioned so that they can more easily obey orders to make illegal arrests.

There are precious few Christian preachers like Michael Marcavage publicly addressing the sins of the nation. And there are even fewer patriots like Cpl. Armbruster, who refused back on 18 April, 2007, to arrest the preachers in the Kutztown case, on the belief that the order was unlawful.

i http://www.repentamerica.com/pressreleases/libertyontrial.html

ii http://www.uncleraisin.com/ur/blog/labels/Kutztown%20Blog%20Files.asp

iii Ibid.