A case that pits abortion opponents against an Allentown women's health clinic has brought lessons about the U.S. constitution to life for a constitutional law scholar and his students.

The case, Kuhns, Mazalewski and Teay vs. the City of Allentown, its police chief and the Allentown Women's Center, is currently scheduled to go to trial in April in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

The dispute focuses on the actions of center volunteers, who hold up plastic tarps to create a passageway that provides privacy as patients walk to the clinic from the parking lot. Pro-life activists argue that this visual barrier violates their First Amendment right to protest against activities at the clinic. The activists claim operators of the health center have conspired with police and other city officials to prevent them from conveying their message.

Professor David S. Cohen, who is representing the health center along with attorneys at the Women's Law Project and Pepper Hamilton LLP, said the case illustrates issues he raises in Constitutional Law classes.

"The constitution doesn't apply to private actors," Cohen said, noting that volunteers from the private non-profit clinic who are using tarps to separate the protesters from the patients have no obligation to honor the First Amendment. "As a private individual, I have no duty to give someone a forum to speak at my private club or in my house. I don't have to let them in my house, if I don't like what they're saying or the way they're dressed."

Cohen said there was no alliance between the clinic or its volunteers and city officials, who — as public actors — must honor the First Amendment.

Yet the protesters, claiming police and other city officials sanctioned and even helped devise the tactic of erecting barriers, have kept their suit alive since it was filed in 2008.

The suit's staying power has surprised Cohen, who initially believed it was an obviously a frivolous complaint and would quickly get dismissed.

But the plaintiffs' success in keeping the battle alive has provided learning opportunities for students who have helped Cohen with the case in each of the last three academic years.

Krysten Connon, a 2L who started working on the case this year, said that the lawsuit has made her aware of issues she'd never contemplated.

The legal battle has pressured the health clinic to turn over video footage from the clinic's surveillance cameras and other information that could put the clinic and its patients at risk, Connon said.

"The protesters can use the discovery process to try to get information about the clinic," Connon said. "Who knows what might happen once the videos are released? It's terrifying."

In some states, Connon said, state legislatures have passed laws allowing warrantless searches of abortion clinic, making providers of reproductive health services — and their patients — very nervous.

Cohen voiced confidence that the clinic will prevail, since there has been no collaboration between public officials and private volunteers that would give credence to a constitutional claim.

In the meantime, he's glad that students are able to gain insights from an active constitutional case. "It's really great to get students involved and to let them see that what we're doing in the classroom has real-world consequences," he said.