The District of Columbia is expected to reply Friday to a request by the Jewish Defense League for a temporary injunction, pending final hearing, of the law prohibiting all but labor demonstrations within 500 feet of an Embassy. The injunction would allow demonstrations near the Soviet Embassy during the upcoming High Holidays. The District’s reply will be presented to Judge Barrington Parker of the US District Court, a spokesman for the District’s corporation counsel said today. Judge Parker will consider the District’s reply before deciding whether to convene a three-judge court to hear the JDL’s bid.
The law is unconstitutional, said Raphael Perl, legal counsel for the JDL here. “Certainly a person’s right to express deeply felt religious beliefs or political beliefs is as sacred as his right to protest that someone hasn’t paid him enough money,” he maintained. The law, passed in 1939 to prevent demonstrations too close to the German and Austrian Embassies, is similar to a Chicago law which the US Supreme Court recently struck down, Perl said. The Chicago law also exempted labor disputes from its prohibition against picketing outside public schools. The Supreme Court held that that was an impermissible distinction between labor picketing and other types of picketing.
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