Inland Northwesterners know something about hate groups.

For a quarter of a century, the region was home to the Aryan Nations, a vile group that celebrated mass murderer Adolf Hitler’s life. At every turn, racist Richard Butler was met by peaceful resistance from a local grass-roots movement that protected minority members and countered Butler’s words of hate with peace and tolerance. The Kootenai County Task Force on Human Relations followed the civil libertarian practice of countering bad speech with more and better speech. Commendably, the task force recognized the Aryans’ right to assemble, parade and speak as it marginalized and helped vanquish the haters.

Lawmakers, both federal and state, should take the same approach to another deplorable hate group: the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan.

The Rev. Fred Phelps and his church followers specialize in hating gays. They burst on the scene several years ago by staging “God Hates Fags” protests at the funerals of AIDS victims and received national attention by picketing the 1998 funeral of Matthew Shepard, the gay University of Wyoming student who was beaten by two men and left to die on a fence near Laramie. Now Phelps’ followers are making headlines by protesting at military funerals of slain U.S. fighters, including the one for Marine Cpl. Phillip Baucus, nephew of U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., on the family ranch near Helena on Sunday.

In Phelps’ convoluted way of thinking, the deaths of our fighting men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan are proof that God is punishing this nation for tolerating gay men and lesbians. The church’s vile Web site celebrates those deaths. The protesters’ picket signs read, among other things: “Thank God for Dead Soldiers” and “Thank God for IEDs (improvised explosive devices).”

Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church should embarrass American Christians. Only the lowest of the low would add to the anguish of grieving family members and relatives of fallen warriors by pushing a political or religious agenda at a funeral.

However, Phelps has the right to do so.

Congress and 25 states were generally wrong in passing laws to prevent groups from picketing funerals. In trying to maintain decorum and respect the dead, lawmakers have crossed a line and attacked the First Amendment. Everyone’s rights are affected when we begin taking away the basic speech and religious rights of repugnant individuals such as Phelps. Correctly, the American Civil Liberties Union, with nose tightly pinched, has filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Westboro Church against a Missouri law that restricts funeral picketing.

The Rev. Vernon Wright and the Plymouth Congregational Church provided a better way to muzzle Phelps and his disciples by confronting them at a freeway interchange along the route to the memorial service for young Baucus. Rather than respond to four of Phelps’ backers with their hate, the Helena Christians repeated the statement: “God loves you,” according to the Billings Gazette.

At other protests, patriotic bikers and sympathetic individuals have shielded mourners from Westboro Baptist placards and taunts.

Society must protect its rights as well as those who mourn until Phelps’ 15 minutes of fame are over.