Kansas ban on funeral protests blocked

by the Kansas Supreme Court.

Looks like it's back to the drawing board for the Kansas legislature.

What doomed the law was an effort to protect the ban from a potential Westboro legal challenge.

When lawmakers unanimously passed the ban, they inserted a so-called “trigger” provision requiring the attorney general to ask for the Supreme Court’s opinion before the ban could take effect. The trigger helped persuade lawmakers, who worried that the state would end up paying the church’s legal fees if church members challenged the law and won.

But the court ruled that the trigger itself was unconstitutional, violating the separation of powers by making the court a type of advisory panel to the Legislature.

Saying it didn’t want to interfere with a legislative action, the court refused to separate the trigger from the rest of the law, meaning the law can’t be enacted or enforced.

And here is the rest of it.