RULINGS IN THE U.S. SUPREME COURT'S TEN COMMANDMENTS CASES

FINDLAW ^ | 6-27-05 | SCOTUS

[OXENinFLA]

RULINGS IN THE U.S. SUPREME COURT'S TEN COMMANDMENTS CASES
June 27, 2005

In different rulings, the justices ban displays of the Ten Commandments at courthouses, but allow them to be placed on government land.

The Courthouse Ruling:

Opinion (McCreary County v. ACLU)
http://laws.findlaw.com/us/000/03-1693.html

The ACLU's Attorney
http://pview.findlaw.com/view/3433759_1

Attorney for Liberty Counsel
http://pview.findlaw.com/view/1438042_1

Case Docket
http://rd.findlaw.com/scripts/nl.pl?url=11198556000_nl

The Government Land Ruling:

Opinion (Van Orden v. Perry)
http://laws.findlaw.com/us/000/03-1500.html

Attorney for Texas
http://pview.findlaw.com/vie

[Txslady]

...so basically if we act as if we are ignorant as to what it stands for, it's OK - but once we act as though it actually stands for something more than just historical purposes, it isn't...

...Just like what the government wants us to be, ignorant. To stand by and allow them to take all of our rights away from us one by one. Beware of what might be taken away; you may never get it back.


What irritates me is that it was okay for Texas to have the 10 commandments on federal land (great news, IMO), but it isn't okay to have them in the court of law.

What is it that some people are so afraid of, highball?? Is it that we might believe in something that means nothing but good, and that only good can come from it, if it is followed?

[antiRepublicrat]

It's easy to reconcile the two decisions. The one where the 10 Commandments stayed is like the facade of the Supreme Court building, where the intent was from the beginning to be a historical context of law. The one that didn't was put up from the beginning to make a statement that our laws come from the religious 10 Commandments, no historical context. The fact that they later added others to try to make a historical context didn't matter -- the initial intent was clear.

In this case and the Grokster case it seems that the Court is going on intention rather than simply the facts of the case.

[Gucho]

PING...


Bump - Thank you.

[highball]

People are afraid of a state religion.

Judging by both past history and the current state of the Church of England, everyone darn well ought to be afraid of that.

[WOSG]

"Viewed on its face, Texas' display has no purported connection to God's role in the formation of Texas or the founding of our Nation; nor does it provide the reasonable observer with any basis to guess that it was erected to honor any individual or organization. The message transmitted by Texas' chosen display is quite plain: This State endorses the divine code of the "Judeo-Christian" God.

For those of us who learned to recite the King James version of the text long before we understood the meaning of some of its words, God's Commandments may seem like wise counsel. The question before this Court, however, is whether it is counsel that the State of Texas may proclaim without violating the Establishment Clause of the Constitution. If any fragment of Jefferson's metaphorical "wall of separation between church and State"2 is to be preserved--if there remains any meaning to the "wholesome 'neutrality' of which this Court's [Establishment Clause] cases speak," School Dist. of Abington Township v. Schempp, 374 U. S. 203, 222 (1963)--a negative answer to that question is mandatory."

The slippery slope lives.

WELCOME U.N. CITIZENS, TO THE NEW SECULAR WORLD ORDER.

ANY CONNECTION TO A CHRISTIAN NATION IS PURELY COINCIDENTAL.

[WOSG]

"People are afraid of a state religion."

Our state religion is now Secularism.
No ifs, and or buts.
What a shambles that even a Republican appointee (OConnor) is making of the Constitution!

"Judging by both past history and the current state of the Church of England, everyone darn well ought to be afraid of that."

Anything but secularism is being destroyed bit by bit.
The state can 'endorse' political nonsense at so many levels, from eco-extremism to various form of multi-culturalism to PC... to deny the Ten Commandments a place in our public square is to create a hostility to religious expression that in itself is a violation of First Amendment rights.

The Justices are violating the 1st Amendment rights of valedictorians, judges in courtrooms (a la Judge Roy Moore), teachers, government workers, etc.

[highball]

I would think that the Texas decision shows your argument to be false.

"Secularism" isn't a religion, no matter how you twist it.

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.

BTW, Roy Moore *was* trying to establish a state religion. He said as much to his followers, that he didn't think other religions weren't valid. We should all be frightened of men in power who push their faith on others.

[Boxsford]

"We should all be frightened of...."

By your own words you really think you are the one who should be telling us to be frightened and who to be frightened of? Really now, how bold.

[X-Ecutioner]

WOW! I didn't know Moses is chiseled into the SCOTUS...
Very interesting....

[JCEccles]

"Secularism" isn't a religion, no matter how you twist it.

Atheism is a belief system just like any religion. Secularism is its outworking.

[Lurking Libertarian]

WOW! I didn't know Moses is chiseled into the SCOTUS...

Yes, he is, along with Mohammed, Hammurabi, Justinian, Napoleon and other lawgivers from history.

[JCEccles]

BTW, Roy Moore *was* trying to establish a state religion.

He wasn't. He was acknowledging a truth about Alabama, its people, and its history that traced back to its founding.

But atheism had been enthroned as the national religion by the Supreme Court, and atheism maintained its monopoly as a result of federal court action.

[WOSG]

"I would think that the Texas decision shows your argument to be false. "

Nope, it confirms it ... Breyer only went along with Texas posting the Ten Commandments because it was devoid of the kind of 'endorsement of religion' that the Supremes find offensive. The same way they judge the christmas creche displays.

To oppose any and all Govt endorsement of religion is to enforce secularism. It is the natural consequence of such a strict set of guidelines.


"Secularism" isn't a religion, no matter how you twist it. "

It's a cop out not to see the big picture... ideology, religion, it's the same thing deep down: The State Religion of the USSR was Marxist-Leninism and it was enforced with a conformity that made the Aztecs human sacrifices look tame. Yet their was no God involved. It is a logical error to think that we have less to fear of a State ideology simply because it doesnt have a diety in the belief system.

"BTW, Roy Moore *was* trying to establish a state religion."

NO HE WASN'T. He was trying to put up a monument to priciples and beliefs he revered. He considered, correctly, that the Ten Commandments and the Christian religion were an inherent part of what made America a blessed nation.

If a Judge cannot be albe to express his own beliefs in his own courtroom, then we have lost freedom of expression in this country. I am sorry you are opponent of such free expression.

"He said as much to his followers, that he didn't think other religions weren't valid. "

To be a believer in one religion is to be a non-believer in other religions. that just says he's an honest man.


"We should all be frightened of men in power who push their faith on others."

... and that includes the secularist ideology, the environmental movement, and a number of ideologies that are given free rein in the schools.

But as for this man, there never was any situation or claim that he forced his views or religion on anyone, nor ruled in a way that exhibited religious discrimination. In fact, some of the amici briefs for him were from Rabbis!

[Txslady]

more then once too, unlike Mohammed, Hammurabi, Justinian, Napoleon and other lawgivers from history...

[kingu]

Well, yes, Moses is center on the BACK of the building, and those tablets are blank. Flanking him are two other rulemakers. I've seen this in person - wow, wonderful artwork. Alas, like much of the artwork in our capital, it is hugely underrated and almost always unnoticed.

[plain talk]

This morning on the radio I heard there is a display of Moses and the tablets inside the SC building over where the justices sit? Anyone know details on this?

[Nebr FAL owner]

The latest decision I believe is one based on an uneasiness the court feels lately that an ever increasing portion of the people no longer have faith in the courts neutrality,fidelity ,honesty ,integrity.

The members of the court see that more & more people view them as basicly wiping there butts with the Constitution when they openly use foriegn treaties that the United States is not a signatory to,foriegn laws that do not apply in the United States , so called "international opinion" to decide cases instead of what they are supposed to use The Constitution of the United States & American law.

This decision is a vain & futile attempt to split the difference and make both sides not totally happy but not willing to basically state that the Court is unworthy of respect by the people & is in fact is an enemy of the people .

Instead what they have done is make the extreme left pissed & provided those people of faith everywhere else in the population further proof that they are basisly weasels . The court subconciously know that if the vast majority of the people decide that the Court isn't worth a damn they know & understand that there aren't enough cops & troops in this country to force wholesale cooperation let alone keep folks from objecting in the streets.

[kingu]

http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/capital.asp tells us...

The wall "right above where the Supreme Court judges sit" is the east wall, on which is displayed a frieze designed by sculptor Adolph A. Weinman. The frieze features two male figures who represent the Majesty of Law and the Power of Government, flanked on the left side by a group of figures representing Wisdom, and on the right side by a group of figures representing Justice:

According to Weinman, the designer of this frieze, the tablet visible between the two central male figures, engraved with the Roman numerals I through X, represents not the Ten Commandments but the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution, collectively known as the Bill of Rights.

• The friezes which adorn the north and south walls of the courtroom in the Supreme Court building (also designed by Adolph Weinman) depict a procession of 18 great lawgivers: Menes, Hammurabi, Moses, Solomon, Lycurgus, Solon, Draco, Confucius and Octavian (south wall); Justinian, Mohammed, Charlemagne, King John, Louis IX, Hugo Grotius, Sir William Blackstone, John Marshall and Napoleon (north wall):
  
  

  According to the Office of the Curator of the Supreme Court of the United States, these figures were selected as a representation of secular law:
  

  Weinman's training emphasized a correlation between the sculptural subject and the function of the building and, because of this, [architect Cass] Gilbert relied on him to choose the subjects and figures that best reflected the function of the Supreme Court building. Faithful to classical sources, Weinman designed for the Courtroom friezes a procession of "great lawgivers of history," from many civilizations, to portray the development of secular law.

[plain talk]

thanks