March 23, 2002
Town take its no-door-to-door pitch to the top
By Francis X. Clines
STRATTON, Ohio — This village's wariness of the door-to-door solicitors denounced locally as "flim-flam men" has drawn the scrutiny of the U.S. Supreme Court, a fact that turns out to be a cause of local pride rivaling the steak dinners at Abdalla's Tavern.
"But we'll have even more pride if the court finally agrees with us," said John M. Abdalla, the mayor, magistrate, steakhouse host and tireless factotum in this village of 277 residents. His 27 years in office have made Abdalla the patriarch of Stratton as it stands in judgment before the nation's high court.
"Our ordinance doesn't pick on Jehovah's Witnesses," Mayor Abdalla insisted, touching the heart of case No. 00-1737, Watchtower Bible and Tract Society v. Village of Stratton.
He denied the history of friction with the town that the Witnesses have complained of and contended that a solicitor's right to free speech could be legally limited at the porch of a resident of Stratton who feels harried by the solicitation.
Four years ago, the town board passed an ordinance requiring solicitors of any product or cause to identify themselves first at town hall and obtain a permit. They would also have to respect any resident's sign against doorway sales pitches.
No one has ever been denied a permit or faced the $100 fine, the mayor said. But a Jehovah's Witnesses congregation in nearby Wellsville challenged the ordinance, saying they had a free-speech right to go door to door in their missionary work.
"We do not believe anyone needs to go to the government for permission to speak to their neighbors," Paul D. Polidoro, the Witnesses lawyer, told the Supreme Court.
In maintaining order with his one-man police force, Abdalla, a retired boilermaker, complains that he has been mightily tested over the years not so much by Jehovah's Witnesses knocking with questions about the hereafter as by the stream of drummers offering hard-sell bargains for the here and now.
The mayor said strangers pester his constituents with sales pitches for frozen meat, paste jewelry, slicers, dicers and what-all else.
The town, hard by the Ohio River on the eastern edge of the state, where its border meets those of Pennsylvania and West Virginia, is easy pickings for such salesmen, the mayor said. They move on as fast as they materialize from the blur of traffic on State Highway 7, often vanishing before Abdalla can spy them from his tavern.
"Some guy at 9:30 the other night knocking on doors, selling Kirby Sweepers," Abdalla said. "I had a complaint call and had him picked up and gave him a stern lecture. Then comes a complaint at 10:30, a guy peddling perfume. And two guys the next night selling vinyl siding. I tell you, it never stops."
Stratton's permit ordinance was upheld by a federal appeals court but caught the eye of the Supreme Court. Is the permit requirement a "censorial weapon," as the Witnesses contend, or a defense of a resident's privacy, as Abdalla believes?
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints filed a friend-of-the-court brief earlier this year saying that cities nationwide are increasingly trying to prohibit door-to-door religious proselyting and that it is critical their missionaries proselyte "without first having to comply with burdensome regulations that impose prior restraints on religious expression."
The justices' questions suggested that, indeed, their ultimate concern involved the right of free speech.
"If I only could have answered those questions," Abdalla said, recalling his visit to the court last month and lamenting that he had to sit silently while some clearly skeptical justices posed stinging questions.
He recounted how Justice Sandra Day O'Connor asked whether children were required to register for Halloween.
"Then Sandra says, 'Do I have to get a permit to borrow a cup of sugar from my neighbor?' " he added, raising his own question of how badly misunderstood could Stratton be.
"This is a small community, less than a mile long, with a lot of retired elderly who want to enjoy the rest of their life and not be bothered by these guys," he said. "People buzz in and buzz out from the four-lane highway. They come with fake Rolexes, fool's gold, and all the rest."
Abdalla drove to court in Washington with his son, John, and some of his eight grandchildren. The next night, he was back at the tavern when "this guy in an orange jacket comes in.
" 'Want to buy some steaks, some meat?' the guy says."
The mayor grinned. "I gave him h---! 'I just come back from the Supreme Court fighting people like you,' I tell him. He said he was from Pittsburgh. But he had a Cleveland Browns jacket on. Imagine the guy trying to flim-flam me like that?"