Sen. Andrew Harris, R-Baltimore County,just stood up to question a bill that would provide penalties for use of an object put on another's property to threaten or intimidate. It originated as a ban on nooses or swastiksa, but was broadened to be ideology-neutral for constitutional reasons.
Harris was wondering whether the bill could be used to protect the tender feelings of public officials.
"If some citizen in a tea party, hangs a public citizen in effigy, does this apply?" Harris asked floor leader Sen. Jamie Raskin, D-Montgomery.
Raskin, a constitutional lawyer, assured Harris the bill had been tailored to meet a Supreme Court test of the legality of anti-intimidation laws and told him he would be the first to volunteer to represent a citizen charged under the statute for hanging an official in effigy.
Harris seemed satisfied. Of course, the last Maryland official to receive wide publicity for being hanged in effigy is U.S. Rep. Frank Kratovil, the Democrat who beat Harrisin 2008 for the House seat from the First District, who was accorded that honor during the debate over health care. Harris is taking a second shot at Kratovil this November.