8 | JULY 28 • 2022 

opinion

Ann Arbor Picketing Ruling is an Injustice 
I 

am writing this in honor 
of Dr. Miriam Brysk, who 
passed away on May 28, 
2022, at the age of 87.
Miriam 
was born in 
Warsaw in 
1935. When the 
Nazis invaded 
Poland, she 
and her family 
escaped to the 
Lida ghetto in 
Belarus, where Miriam, at 
the age of 7, witnessed the 
execution of Lida’s Jews on 
May 8, 1942. Miriam’s family 
was spared because her father 
was a physician, and the 
Nazis conscripted her father 
into treating wounded Nazi 
soldiers.
In November 1942, Jews in 
the Russian partisans rescued 
Miriam’s family from the 
ghetto and brought them to 
the nearby Lipiczany forest, 
where the Russian partisans 
were hiding from the Nazis 
and conducting raids on 
the Nazi forces. Her father 
established a surgical hospital 
in the forest to treat Jewish 
and Russian partisans alike. 
Miriam’s head was shaved, and 
she wore boy’s clothing and 
was given a pistol to protect 
herself from being raped.
After the war, her family 
immigrated to the United 
States in February 1947, 
as she turned 12 years old. 
She came to America with 
no knowledge of English or 
previous schooling and had a 
lot of catching up to do.
She finished high school 
at 17 years of age, obtained a 
Bachelor of Science in biology 

and chemistry from NYU, 
a Master of Science from 
the University of Michigan 
in Microbiology, and then 
a Ph.D. in Biological and 
Biomedical Sciences from 
Columbia University.
After obtaining her Ph.D., 
she became a professor at the 
University of Texas in three 
medical school departments, 
Dermatology, Microbiology 
and Biochemistry, and then 
became the director of the 
Dermatology Research 
Laboratory at the University 
of Texas Medical Branch. In 
1971, she and her husband, 
Henry Brysk, who was also 
a survivor of the Holocaust 
from France and a theoretical 
physicist, moved to Ann 
Arbor.
Miriam attended services 
at the Pardes Hannah 
congregation, located in the 
annex next to Beth Israel 
Synagogue. At her funeral, 
her two daughters gave 
poignant eulogies, celebrating 
Miriam’s love of life, fiercely 
independent spirit, intellectual 
and scientific curiosity, and 
her loving devotion to them 
and to Henry.

LAWSUIT FILED
I had the honor of 
representing Miriam, in 
conjunction with Marvin 
Gerber, in a lawsuit filed in 
the U.S. District Court in 
Detroit, seeking to obtain 
an injunction to curtail the 
weekly protests of the neo-
Nazi, antisemitic protesters 
who have been plaguing Beth 
Israel every Shabbat morning 
for now 18 years.

As a Holocaust survivor 
who had witnessed the 
depredations caused by 
the Nazis, fueled by their 
antisemitism, and a fervent 
supporter of Israel, Miriam 
was incensed at seeing the 
antisemitic and anti-Israel 
signs in front of Beth Israel 
whenever she attended 
services at Pardes Hannah, 
signs bearing such messages 
as “Jewish Power Corrupts”; 
“Resist Jewish Power”; “No 
More Holocaust Movies”; 
“Boycott Israel”; and “Stop 
U.S. Aid To Israel.”
At the end of the affidavit 
which Miriam signed and 
which was filed with the 
federal court in support of 
the lawsuit, Miriam wrote: 
“The protesters try to compare 
Israel to Nazi Germany, but 
they do not know what they 
are talking about. I have 
visited Israel many times. 
As a Holocaust survivor, as 
a person who saw with my 
own eyes what the Nazis did, 
for the protesters to compare 
Israel with Nazi Germany 
sickens and angers me. They 
were not there. I was.”
In the lawsuit which I 
filed on behalf of Miriam 
and Mr. Gerber, we were 
seeking, first and foremost, 
a limited injunction to 
place reasonable time, place 
and manner distance and 
temporal restrictions on the 
protesters’ conduct, a form 
of relief which is frequently 
granted in numerous lawsuits, 
including lawsuits involving 
protests at abortion clinics. 
Were not a synagogue and its 
congregants entitled to the 

same degree of protection of 
their constitutional right of 
freedom of worship, not to 
be harassed and stalked, as 
women asserting their, then 
constitutional right to obtain 
an abortion?
To my deepest 
disappointment and 
consternation, we lost the 
lawsuit. Judge Victoria 
Roberts dismissed the case, 
claiming that the emotional 
distress which Miriam and 
Mr. Gerber indicated they 
experienced upon seeing 
the signs in front of the 
synagogue, did not constitute 
a “concrete” injury sufficient 
to afford them “standing” to 
sue in the context of the First 
Amendment right of free 
speech.
I frankly found that ruling 
astoundingly ludicrous, in 
light of the thousands of 
lawsuits, in both state and 
federal courts, in which 
emotional distress was the 
only basis upon which the 
plaintiffs were allowed to sue. 

RULING ON APPEAL
On appeal, the Sixth Circuit 
Court of Appeals, in a 2-1 
decision, reversed Judge 
Roberts’ ruling, stating, “[T]he 
congregants have standing to 
sue because they have credibly 
pleaded an injury — extreme 
emotional distress — that has 
stamped a plaintiff’s ticket 
into court for centuries.”
The court went further, 
however, and addressed 
an issue which was not 
legitimately addressed by 
Judge Roberts, an issue which 
she was precluded from 

Marc 
Susselman

PURELY COMMENTARY

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