COLUMBIA, S.C. - The trial for longtime activist Brett Bursey was delayed Tuesday for at least a month because of a technicality.

More than 70 people packed a federal courtroom expecting to hear the federal government's case against the 54-year-old activist.

But before the trial could start, Bursey's lawyers brought up a technicality that has to do with what prosecutors must prove to convict Bursey.

"It's a fairly technical dispute," Assistant U.S. Attorney John Barton said. "It's a question of what the statute requires the government to prove to convict him."

Bursey, who began a lifetime of protesting war and inequities in the 1960s, faces a seldom-used charge of entering a restricted space around the president of the United States.

If convicted, he faces six months in prison and a fine of $5,000.

Bursey says he was arrested at the Columbia Metropolitan Airport in October during President Bush's visit because his message was anti-war. He initially was charged by airport police with trespassing, but that charge was dropped.

Bursey's attorney Bill Nettles said "it's extremely critical" that the technicality is cleared up before trial.

"It would have been a huge waste of time not to know what the rules are," Nettles said.

Part of the technicality involves a difference in punctuation in the government's complaint and the 500-word statute that Bursey is being charged under, said attorney C. Rauch Wise, who also represented Bursey when he was arrested in 1969 during a visit by then-President Richard Nixon.

Bursey and another one of his attorneys, Lewis Pitts, met with about 20 supporters outside the courthouse to answer questions about the delay.

"I really commend Brett for not folding his tent," Pitts said to rousing applause. "We contend what they (prosecutors) allege doesn't even amount to a crime."

Bursey said if he wins the case he will sue to recover his trial costs. "I've been terribly inconvenienced by all of this," he said.

A trial date likely won't be set until at least the end of July. Barton will have to file papers with the court by July 9, then the defense gets until July 23 to respond.

U.S. Magistrate Bristow Marchant said he probably would rule within a week of receiving Bursey's response to prosecutors' filings.