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Supreme Court to hear Operation Rescue appeal

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Supreme Court agreed Monday to consider whether federal anti-racketeering law has been used improperly against protesters from the anti-abortion group Operation Rescue.

Anti-abortion activist Joseph Scheidler and others say authorities went too far in ordering protesters to pay damages for blocking entrances to clinics where abortions are performed. The justices agreed Monday to hear arguments in the case this fall.

The ruling marks the second time the Supreme Court has agreed to hear arguments in the long-running case.

The court already has determined that clinic operators can sue the protesters for damages using the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO. This time they will examine the limits of how that law may be applied.

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The National Organization for Women and womens' clinic operators who had won damages in lower courts argued against the Supreme Court taking up the case.

But a variety of activist organizations that historically have resorted to civil disobedience in social protest -- including the Southern Christian Leadership Conference -- are supporting Operation Rescue.

The case that the court accepted Monday could affect the number and size of protests of all sorts, not just at clinics.

The Associated Press reported that with this case, the Supreme Court is not looking at the constitutionality of abortion itself, nor wider questions about the political or religious messages of the abortion protesters.

The court in 1992 reaffirmed the core holding of its landmark Roe v. Wade decision of 1973, that women have a constitutional right to abortion.

The cases are Scheidler v. National Organization for Women, 01-1118, and Operation Rescue v. National Organization for Women, 01-1119.