In 2004, members of the Christian group Repent America were arrested by Philadelphia police on charges including ethnic intimidation because of a confrontation during their preaching and picketing at OutFest, a gay pride festival. They subsequently filed suit challenging the constitutionality of Pennsylvania's ethnic intimidation law that was amended in 2002 to add sexual orientation and several other categories to its previous coverage of crimes committed because of race, religion or national origin. Yesterday in Marcavage v. Rendell, (PA Commnw. Ct., Nov. 15, 2007), the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court, in a 6-1 decision, struck down the statute because of the legislative procedures used to enact it. The Commonwealth Court is one of Pennsylvania's intermediate appellate courts.
Art. I, Sec. 3 of Pennsylvania's constitution provides that "no bill shall be so altered or amended, on its passage through either House, as to change its original purpose." The court held that the ethnic intimidation amendments, that began as a bill to criminalize crop destruction, violates this constitutional provision because the final provisions bear no nexus to the conduct at which the original legislation was directed. Reporting on the decision, today's Philadelphia Enquirer says that Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell has called on the legislature to re-enact the invalidated provisions.
