By Bill Miller
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 5, 2000; Page B01

A Maryland minister has prevailed in a legal fight over his right to lead small groups of people in prayer while they tour the U.S. Capitol.

The Rev. Pierre Bynum, a pastor from Charles County, filed a federal lawsuit after Capitol Police threatened to arrest him in November 1996 for conducting a "prayer tour" of the building. Capitol Police said Bynum was staging an illegal demonstration.

U.S. District Judge Paul L. Friedman said that Bynum's actions were not a form of demonstration and that Bynum had a constitutional right to engage in free speech.

In a 17-page decision released Monday, the judge said Capitol Police improperly relied upon a regulation created to prevent disruptions on Capitol grounds and found that Bynum and his group had caused no disturbance by praying. The regulation bars unspecified kinds of "expressive conduct" but makes no mention of prayer.

"It's a tremendous victory," Bynum said of the ruling. "When this event first happened, we were absolutely stupefied. . . . We were praying for our country."

Bynum, 51, is a leader of a group called Capitol Hill Prayer Alert that prays for the United States, its government and elected officials. Among other things, the group's Web site encourages people to pray for God's "sudden sovereign intervention" to turn President Clinton and other political leaders against abortion and homosexuality.

Bynum's Capitol tour, conducted just before the 1996 presidential election, was part of a series of visits linked with a 40-day prayer vigil. He said he had taken guests on similar tours there about 30 times until he was threatened with arrest Nov. 3, 1996. At the time, Bynum was associate pastor of Waldorf Christian Assembly in Waldorf.

That day, Bynum was leading his family and a small Northern Virginia church group to various historic sites within the building. Along the way, Bynum occasionally paused to raise topics for reflection, and the people in the group closed their eyes, bowed their heads and folded their hands. Then Capitol Police ordered the activity to stop.

Aided by attorneys from the American Center for Law and Justice, Bynum initially sought an apology from the Capitol Police, believing the incident stemmed from a misunderstanding. When officials defended their actions, he decided to file suit.

James Matthew Henderson Sr., one of Bynum's attorneys, praised the court's decision, saying, "It's sort of the best of American values to protect this kind of speech."

Government lawyers contended prayer had been banned unless conducted in the Capitol's chapel or other designated places at the invitation of members of Congress. They said they were reviewing Friedman's decision and had not decided whether to appeal.

The government's arguments relied upon a 1946 federal law that makes it illegal to "parade, demonstrate or picket within any of the Capitol Buildings." Government lawyers also said prayer was covered in a Capitol Police regulation that defines demonstrations to include "expressive conduct that conveys a message supporting or opposing a point of view or has the intent, effect or propensity to attract a crowd of onlookers."

Friedman struck down the regulation as unconstitutionally vague. He said the law banning demonstrations was aimed at preventing disruptions in Congress, "not activities such as quiet praying, accompanied by bowed heads and folded hands."