For those who are interested in "actually doing something" in the fight against the WTS, other than posting to DBs, here is a recent US Court Opinion which does a good job of explaining that US Homeowners have the legal right to forbid solicitors (including JWs) from entering their private property, including explaining all the constitutional and legal issues.
Although this case deals with an Newspaper/Advertising Distributor, JWs and "freedom of religion" are also addressed by this lengthy Opinion. It is well worth the read for anyone interested in fighting the WTS using this avenue.
... http://www.cmcnyls.edu/public/USCases/Tillman.HTM
Here is an excerpt for those unwilling to read the entire Opinion:
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"The Court has traditionally respected the right of a householder to bar, by order or notice, solicitors, hawkers, and peddlers from his property. See Martin v. Struthers, supra; cf. Hall v. Commonwealth, 188 Va 72, 49 S.E.2d 369, appeal dismissed, 335 U.S. 875 (1948). In this case the mailer's right to communicate is circumscribed only by an affirmative act of the addressee giving notice that he wishes no further mailings from that mailer.
"To hold less would tend to license a form of trespass and would make hardly more sense than to say that a radio or television viewer may not twist the dial to cut off an offensive or boring communication and thus [*10] bar its entering his home. Nothing in the Constitution compels us to listen to or view any unwanted communication, whatever its merit; we see no basis for according the printed word or pictures a different or more preferred status because they are sent by mail".
As noted in Rowan v U.S. Post Off. Dept. (397 U.S. 728, supra), the Supreme Court has "traditionally respected the right of a householder to bar, by order or notice, solicitors, hawkers, and peddlers from his property" (Rowan v U.S. Post Off. Dept., supra, at 737, citing Martin v Struthers, 319 U.S. 141). Under this more "traditional" approach, the court upheld an ordinance forbidding the entry onto private property by solicitors, hawkers, peddlers, itinerant merchants and transient vendors, in the absence of a prior invitation by the owners and occupiers (Breard v City of Alexandria, 341 U.S. 622). The Breard court stated, in part:
"The First and Fourteenth Amendments have never been treated as absolutes. Freedom of speech or press does not mean that one can talk or distribute where, when and how one chooses. Rights other than those of the advocates are involved. By adjustment of rights, we can have both full [*11] liberty of expression and an orderly life" (Breard v City of Alexandria, 341 U.S. 622, 642).
The Breard court went on to distinguish Martin v City of Struthers (319 U.S. 141) as having been "narrowly limited to the precise fact of the free distribution
of an invitation to religious services" (341 U.S. 622, 643). In Martin v City of Struthers (319 U.S. 141, supra), the court had invalidated a local law which forbade the door-to-door distribution of handbills, and which had been used against Jehovah's Witnesses who had gone door to door with invitations to a religious meeting. Justice Black, writing for the court in Martin v City of Struthers (supra), concluded that the local law infringed on the freedom to distribute information, [**>>**>>**>>] but also acknowledged the propriety of leaving "with the homeowner himself" the
power to decide "whether distributors of literature may lawfully call at a home" (Martin v City of Struthers, supra, at 148). (end of excerpt)