Law enforcement officials there threatened to enforce Iowa’s flag-desecration laws against those protesting the July 14, 2012, service for Army Sgt. James Skalberg. The Westboro church said in its lawsuit that protesters decided not to use the flag to express their feelings because they feared arrest.

In December, U.S. District Judge Robert Pratt struck down those laws, describing them as “unconstitutionally overbroad” in a 25-page decision. An earlier version of the bill prohibited using an American flag, a military flag or a prisoner of war flag within 1,000 feet of a funeral in such a way that it would provoke another to commit assault. But that provision was amended out of the bill.

The bill signed into law Friday amends previous law, prohibiting those within 1,000 feet of a funeral from disrupting a service, noisily causing funeral-goers distress, and making abusive epithets or threatening gestures likely to provoke a violent reaction. Previous law prohibited such behavior within 500 feet of a funeral.

Nebraska has a law prohibiting the mutilation of a flag, though that statute was ruled unconstitutional by a federal judge in 2010. The law remains on the books.