Posted on 12/29/2004 6:35:31 AM PST by MainFrame65
The high court should stop its disingenuous sidestep of the church-state debate.
The U.S. Supreme Court recently agreed to hear a pair of cases testing the constitutionality of displays of the Ten Commandments on government property. The Court finally agreed to reconcile conflicting lower rulings-concerning the display of a six-foot monument on the grounds of the Texas State Capitol in one case, and another involving framed copies of the commandments on Kentucky courthouse walls. The two cases have legitimate differences: The Texas display is part of a collection, the Kentucky "collection" sprung up to protect the display. The Texas monument is in a "museum-like" setting. The Kentucky display is on a court wall. The Texas Commandments monument was a gift, and has stood uncontested for decades. But underlying all the details is a profound problem: a tendency to disregard the religious in our religion cases.
(Excerpt) Read more at law.com ...
Here is a direct link to the article.
http://www.law.com/jsp/tal/PubArticleTAL.jsp?id=1101136515493
Let's see here... As you enter the Supreme Court courtroom, the two huge oak doors have the Ten Commandments engraved on each lower portion of each door.
You be the judge.
Why is it that all the legal upper muckity mucks make something so plain & simple so confusing & complicated?
Separation of church & state DOES NOT EXIST!
The Constitution only prohibits the FEDERAL government from establishing a religion, not the states.
Christianity is part of the Common, or Natural Law. Therefore it is Christianity that is the basis of our government. Religion of any other type is not synonymous with the American experience of Liberty!"
God . . . is the promulgator as well as the author of natural law.
Justice James Wilson, a signer of the Declaration, the Constitution, Original Justice on the U. S. Supreme Court, and the father of the first organized legal training in America.
“It is the right as well as the duty of all men in society publicly and at stated seasons, to worship the Supreme Being, the great Creator and Preserver of the universe: . . . As the happiness of a people and the good order and preservation of civil government essential depend upon piety, religion, and morality, and as these cannot be generally diffused through a community but by the institution of the public worship of God and of Public instructions in piety, religion and morality...”
Justice Brewer Trinity v. United States. 1892
The “law of nature” is a rule of conduct arising out of the natural relations of human beings established by the Creator and existing prior to any positive precept. . . . [These] have been established by the Creator, and are, with a peculiar felicity of expression, denominated in Scripture, “ordinances of heaven.”
Noah Webster, Judge and Legislator
I could go on and on with examples like this.
The single reason government promotes this lie is to try to avoid having to follow these moral/natural laws ITSELF, therefore leaving it unrestrained when it runs contrary to the WILL of the people.
Near the end, the author raises the following arguments, and argues that the court should face the real questions instead of excusing itself from deciding the serious issues.
QUOTE:
"Is there anything other than hostility to religion available under current jurisprudence? It [this case] would force us to determine whether we want meaningful and powerful religious symbols in public spaces, rather than defining the problem away by theorizing those symbols have little or no religious meaning.
Such an acknowledgment would force the Court to go back and tackle the real question animating these religion cases: Does the Constitution truly erect a “wall” between church and state, or is this, as most citizens maintain, a politically correct overcompensation? Was the intent of the Framers to quarantine all religion from the public square, or was it merely to keep the state from enshrining a single state religion? "
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As a Jew, I am not offended by a display of the Ten Commandments, although my list differs slightly from the modern (2000 years) version. Clearly, any attempt to remove it from the heritage of law is laughable, and those who make the attempt deserve our derision - and our opposition.
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