Posted on 11/19/2002 8:36:24 AM PST by Dallas
It creates the impression that a citizen who (for example) does not worship the God of Abraham is not equal before the court to one who does. Such an inequality, or even the appearance thereof, is unacceptable. QED.
That's an ironic choice of words coming from a supporter of the 10 Commandments.
Luckily the command "Thou shalt not cuss" was the 14th commandment, on the ill-fated tablet dropped by Moses.
The chief justice of Alabama's Supreme Court vowed to appeal a federal judge's order that he remove a Ten Commandments monument from the rotunda of the state's judicial building.
Attorney Stephen Melchior said Chief Justice Roy Moore would ask the appellate courts to allow the 5,300-pound granite monument to stay in the judicial building until the appeals process is completed.
U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson ruled Monday that the monument installed by the chief justice goes too far in promoting religion and ordered it removed within 30 days.
Thompson said he does not believe all Ten Commandment displays in government buildings are illegal, but he said the monument Moore placed in the rotunda of the state building crosses the line "between the permissible and the impermissible."
"Its sloping top and the religious air of the tablets unequivocally call to mind an open Bible resting on a podium," Thompson said.
Thompson said if Moore fails to remove the monument at his own expense, the federal court will issue an injunction forcing him to remove it.
Moore had no immediate comment, but scheduled a news conference for Tuesday morning. Melchior said he didn't think Thompson understood Moore's testimony over almost three days of the trial.
Thompson "uses the term religion 97 times in the opinion and the term religious 50 times, but goes on to talk about how it's dangerous to define the term religion. This is very troublesome to me. I can't imagine the appellate court buying such interesting logic," Melchior said.
The chief justice testified during the trial that the commandments are the moral foundation of American law. He said he installed the monument partly because of his concern that the country has suffered a moral decline over the past 40 or 50 years as a result of federal court rulings, including those against prayer in public schools.
Opponents of the monument argued that it promoted the judge's conservative Christian faith in violation of the Constitution's ban on government establishment of religion.
"Justice Moore was trying to force his religious beliefs on the people of Alabama. He turned the hall of justice into a religious sanctuary where people drop to their knees and pray," said Morris Dees, lead counsel and co-founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center, which joined in a lawsuit to remove the monument.
Moore became known as the "Ten Commandments Judge" when he fought to display a wooden plaque of the commandments on his courtroom wall in Etowah County. He easily won election as chief justice in 2000 and installed the monument the next year without telling any other justices.
The monument features the King James Bible version of the Ten Commandments sitting on top of a granite block. Around the monument are quotes from historical figures and documents, such as the Declaration of Independence.
Are you saying you think you can prove in civil court that you have been harmed by me working on the Sabbath or believing in another god?
Actually Our legal system is based upon them. The 10 Commandments are the foundation of the English common law system. Our legal system arose from English Common Law, which is why the Surpreme Court has a depiction of the 10 Commendments at their court(just like this judge).
So, you are saying they meant for violations of the Ten Commandments to be punished by government?
Interesting. It looks to me like he's demonstrating a contempt for laws. He's had a court order, and refuses to obey it. Maybe people who have gotten orders from his court should take the message to heart.
Drew Garrett
Many societies which did not have the ten commandments outlawed murder, theft, etc. The Romans had the most impact on our basic laws as they established them throughout Europe and th subsequently English law greatly influence statutes in the US.
It may be arguable whether the judge can post the commandments, but it is clear that they are not the basis for our laws.
By the way, most of the country had Blue Laws and stores were closed on Sunday. It sounds like you're too young to remember.
The posting of the Ten Commandments in an Alabama courthouse does not a theocracy make. Quit swooning and hyperventilating.
And if you want to find truly world-class disasters in goverment, you need look no further than the officially atheist states--any of them: the late unlamented Soviet Union, the People's Republic of China, Hoxha's Albania, Pol Pot's Cambodia etc. For some reason mass-murder-by-government and atheism gp together like peanut butter and jelly.
Atheist libertarians exercise curiously selective judgment when it comes to America's past. They recall with great fondness and seek to return to the days when Americans could smoke opium to their hearts' content but shrink in horror over the prosepct of a 19th Century America when Judeo-Christian tradions and prayers filled out courthouses, government halls, and other public fora. You call that a theocracy. I call that a strong, vigorous nation whose traditions were rooted in Judeo-Christian beliefs and practices. Tocqueville certainly described it that way.
In the presence of God, Amen. We...do by these presents solemnly and mutually in ye presence of God, and one another, covenant and combine ourselves into a civil body politic.” -- The Mayflower Compact, 1620
We “...enter into a combination and confederation together to maintain and preserve the liberty and purity of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ which we now profess.” -- The Fundamental Orders of Connecticut, 1638
“Whereas the glory of Almighty God and this good of mankind is the reason and the end of government and therefore government itself is a venerable ordinance of God....” -- The Great Law of Pennsylvania Colony
“The rights to freedom being the gift of God Almighty...The rights of the colonists as Christians may be best understood by reading and carefully studying the institutes of the great Law Giver which are to be found clearly written and promulgated in the New Testament.”-- Samuel Adams, 1772
1777 - The First Continental Congress appropriate funds to import 20,000 Holy Bibles as “the great political textbook of the patriots.”
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men....” -- The Declaration of Independence, 1776
“Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair; the event is in the hand of God.” -- George Washington, 1787
“God who gave us life, gave us liberty.” – Thomas Jefferson “Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed conviction that the liberties are the gift of God?” – Thomas Jefferson Memorial
“I have lived, Sir, a long time and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth: that God governs in the affairs of man. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the Sacred Writings that except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it. I firmly believe this....” -- Benjamin Franklin, 1787
“...the propitious smiles of heaven cannot be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which heaven itself has ordained....” – George Washington’s Inaugural Address, 1787
“Whereas, it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits and humbly to implore His protection and favor.” -- Washington’s Thanksgiving Proclamation, 1789
“and let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion.” -- Washington’s Farewell Address, 1797
“It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded not by religionists but by Christians, not on religions but on the gospel of Jesus Christ.” -- Patrick Henry
“The first and almost only Book deserving of universal attention is the Bible. The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of Civil Government with the principle of Christianity.” -- John Quincy Adams
“Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers and it is the duty as well as the privilege and interest of a Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers.” – John Jay, first Chief Justice of the United States 1789-1795
“It is the duty of all nations, as well as of men, to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God and to recognize the sublime truth announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord.” -- Abraham Lincoln, 1861
“...that we here highly resolve...that this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom and that the government of the people...shall not perish from the earth.” -- Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, 1863
“Our laws and our institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teaching of the Redeemer of Mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise: and in this sense and to this extent our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian...This is a religious people. This is historically true. From the discovery of this continent to the present hour there is a single voice making this affirmation...we find everywhere a clear recognizance of the same truth. These and many other matters which might be noticed, add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation.” -- The Supreme Court of the United States, 1892
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