They missed the most fundamental reason that the statue should stay. Only Congress could establish a religion through their powers to legislate and they haven’t done that.
The same reason Judge Roy Moore’s Ten Commandments monument should still be in front of his court house.
I thought the meaning of the exclusion clause was that the government could NOT establish a common religion (congress/legislature etc)?
Totally wrong/backwards. The federal congress is singled out as being prohibited from making laws respecting religion in the First Amendment. In the 9th and 10th Amendments its made clear that this prohibition is for the Federal government and that the people and states retain any power not except those positively granted by the Federal Constitution to the Federal government.