Source: Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/features/religion/la-fg-blasphemy6mar06,1,5881357.story
A funny thing happened in November when Britain launched a righteous protest over Sudan's arrest of a British schoolteacher accused of insulting Islam by letting her students name a class teddy bear Muhammad.
The Sudanese ambassador was summoned; Prime Minister Gordon Brown issued a protest. But it didn't take long for someone to point out that Downing Street was standing on diplomatic quicksand: Britain itself has a law making blasphemy a crime.
Thus began a period of collective soul-searching on free speech and secularism, traditional values and the church that anoints Britain's queen. It culminated Wednesday in a 148-87 vote in the House of Lords to abolish the laws on blasphemy after a wrenching, two-hour debate.