Disturbing Meeting Law and Legal Definition
Under the early common law, it was a crime to disturb persons gathered or assembled for the purpose of religious worship, and it was also a misdemeanor to disturb wantonly an assemblage of persons met together for any lawful purpose, particularly meetings of a distinctly moral or benevolent character. Statutes prohibiting disruption of lawful meetings, processions, or gatherings proscribe those disruptive physical actions and verbal utterances that are in violation of the normal customs and rules of governance, implicit or explicit, of the meeting. The purpose of enactments prohibiting disruption or disturbance of meetings is to ensure the unhindered transaction of the normal business a reasonable person would expect to occur at such meetings.
