Scheidler v. National Organization for Women, Inc.
The Supreme Court ruled that antiabortion protesters who blockaded and disrupted abortion clinics did not commit "extortion" under the federal Hobbs Act, because they never actually obtained any property from the clinics — they only interfered with the clinics' ability to operate.
Since extortion was the key wrongdoing underlying the clinics' racketeering lawsuit, the Court's ruling wiped out the jury verdict and a nationwide injunction against the protesters, though the decision leaves room for other laws, like a separate federal clinic-access statute, to address similar conduct.
“Petitioners neither pursued nor received "something of value from" respondents that they could exercise, transfer, or sell.”
Explaining why the protesters' conduct did not meet the Hobbs Act's requirement of obtaining property.
How it got here: A jury found a racketeering violation and the trial court issued a nationwide injunction; the Seventh Circuit affirmed, and the protesters asked the Supreme Court to review the case a second time.
The Case in Depth
What happened
Antiabortion activists, led by Joseph Scheidler's Pro-Life Action Network, engaged in a nationwide campaign of blockades, trespassing, and threats aimed at shutting down clinics that performed abortions. The National Organization for Women and two clinics sued the activists, arguing this campaign amounted to a racketeering conspiracy built on extortion, entitling the clinics to damages and a nationwide injunction against future protest activity.
The question before the Court
Could antiabortion protesters who blocked and disrupted clinics be found guilty of "extortion" under a federal anti-racketeering law just for interfering with a clinic's operations?
Why it matters
Abortion clinics and other businesses can no longer use this federal racketeering law to sue disruptive protesters just because the protesters interfered with operations, unless they actually acquired something of value. Groups that had used the threat of large racketeering damages and nationwide injunctions to deter clinic blockades lost that particular legal tool, though other laws targeting clinic violence remain available.
What changes now
Because the racketeering verdict is reversed, the nationwide injunction against the protesters is also vacated. The Court did not reach the separate question of whether private parties can even get injunctions under this racketeering law, since there was no valid violation to enforce. The ruling is final on the merits, though other federal laws — like the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act — remain available to address clinic violence and obstruction.
What this does not decide
The Court did not decide whether private plaintiffs can ever get injunctions under this racketeering law's civil provisions, since it never reached that question. It also did not rule that the protesters' conduct was lawful — the Court noted some of it was clearly criminal, just not "extortion" under this particular statute.
Concurrences and dissents
Concurrence — Justice Ginsburg
Justice Ginsburg agreed fully but emphasized that Congress had already passed a separate law, the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, specifically targeting clinic violence, so a ruling against the protesters here would mainly have expanded the racketeering law's reach into other unrelated cases. She stressed that the racketeering law already carries severe criminal and civil penalties and cautioned against reading it too broadly.
Dissent — Justice Stevens
“For decades federal judges have uniformly given the term "property" an expansive construction that encompasses the intangible right to exercise exclusive control over the lawful use of business assets.”Stevens's objection that the majority departed from decades of settled lower-court interpretation.
Justice Stevens argued that federal courts had uniformly and for decades read 'obtaining' property under the Hobbs Act to include acquiring intangible control over a business's operations, such as the right to solicit customers, and that the protesters' campaign of violence to force clinics to give up control fit squarely within that established definition. He would have upheld the verdict and warned the ruling mainly benefits people who use violence to interfere with businesses.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The Court began with the Hobbs Act's definition of extortion, which requires that a person 'obtain' property from another using force, fear, or threats — not merely interfere with or deprive someone of their property.
- Looking to the common-law and historical roots of the term, the Court found that extortion has always required both a loss to the victim and a corresponding gain or acquisition by the wrongdoer, not simply a loss alone.
- The Court distinguished extortion from the separate, lesser crime of coercion, which involves using force or threats to restrict someone's freedom of action without necessarily acquiring anything of value; Congress included extortion but deliberately left coercion out of the Hobbs Act.
- Applying this framework, the Court found that the protesters disrupted and even shut down clinic operations, but never acquired anything of value that they could use, transfer, or sell, so they never 'obtained' property from the clinics.
- Because the jury's racketeering verdict rested on the extortion finding (along with related state-law extortion and Travel Act violations that depended on the same extortion theory), all of the predicate offenses supporting the RICO verdict collapsed once extortion was ruled out.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Reaffirms United States v. Enmons (410 U.S. 396)
The Court relied on Enmons to confirm extortion requires both deprivation and acquisition of property, plus the rule of lenity.