Judge: Protesters can stay at Capitol

Occupy Columbia protesters will continue their around-the-clock demonstrations on the State House lawn after a federal judge determined that state government does not have regulations in place to prevent camping and overnight stays.

And, now, state officials will be writing new rules to address the issue.

U.S. District Judge Cameron M. Currie said the State Budget and Control Board has the authority to create regulations to prohibit camping and sleeping. However, none exist, and policies regarding the use of the State House grounds have been inconsistently applied and were ever-changing for the Occupy Columbia protesters, Currie said.

Currie awarded the preliminary injunction barring the state from removing protesters Wednesday after a two-hour hearing. She asked the state’s attorneys questions about existing regulations for using the State House and its grounds and Gov. Nikki Haley’s authority to create rules for their use.

Currie said any new rules would have to be applied equally to all groups.

The hearing was held after seven Occupy Columbia protesters who were arrested filed a lawsuit against Haley and the state over their First Amendment rights to free speech and to peaceful assembly.

The state plans to rewrite the rules that govern the use of the grounds, said Kevin Hall, one of the attorneys who represented Haley during the hearing. The Budget and Control Board, which oversees the building and grounds, will act quickly, he said.

“The court was clear in that camping and sleeping on the State House grounds can be prohibited,” Hall said.

In her opinion, Currie also expressed concern that the protesters’ First Amendment rights were being violated.

“Defendant Governor Haley describes the issue in this case as ‘whether the State may prevent individuals from becoming permanent squatters on public land.’ The court disagrees with this characterization and concludes the issue is more accurately expressed as whether the State may prohibit continuous protesting and camping on the State House grounds when no law, regulation, or valid restriction prohibits that expressive conduct,” Currie wrote in her order. “The court finds that although camping and sleeping are not speech in the traditional sense, the First Amendment protects Occupy Columbia’s 24-hour occupation of the State House grounds as symbolic conduct.”

After the hearing, Ashley Blewer, one of the Occupy members who joined in the lawsuit, said the protest will continue since the “ball is in the government’s court.”

“We would all like to emphasize that we’re not camping as a leisurely activity,” Blewer said. “We’re occupying the State House grounds as a political statement.”

Hall acknowledged the issue over whether the overnight stays were an expression of free speech was not settled. A federal judge in Minneapolis ruled that overnight camp-outs could be prohibited on a county government plaza while a federal judge in Nashville has allowed camping around Tennessee’s capitol complex to continue.

“Courts have differences of opinion on that,” Hall said. “For our purposes today, it was not necessary to address that.”

The Occupy Columbia protest took up residence at the State House on Oct. 15. Since then, more than a dozen people have maintained a continuous presence on the lawn, with the crowd swelling to 200 on some days.

On Nov. 16, Haley ordered protesters to leave by 6 p.m. or they would be arrested by the S.C. Bureau of Protective Services. The protesters removed their tarps and sleeping bags, but 19 people were arrested after they refused to leave.

Five days after the arrests, about 200 people defied the curfew by holding a free speech rally on the State House steps after 6 p.m. And, 5th Circuit Solicitor Dan Johnson dropped the trespassing charges against the 19, saying no laws had been broken.

Haley has since backed off her curfew.

Protesters returned to their overnight stays Nov. 23 after a Richland County judge issued a temporary restraining order against Haley and the State Budget and Control Board.

The Budget and Control Board is set to meet today. The issue is not on the agenda, and Haley has previously argued board members can’t discuss items not on the agenda. The next meeting is set for Jan. 31. Other members of the board are the state comptroller, state treasurer and chairmen of the House and Senate budget-writing committees.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.