Posted on 05/21/2005 9:58:14 PM PDT by BigFinn
The San Diego City Council voted this week to allow voters to decide the fate of the historic Mt. Soledad Cross overlooking the Pacific Ocean in La Jolla.
The vote represented the newest chapter in a long line of legal battles to remove the cross, led by ACLU attorney James McElroy, who represents an atheist seeking to remove the Christian symbol from public lands.
The legal battles date back to 1989.
Essentially, the voters will decide whether they want to transfer the property to the National Park System as a war memorial.
For more than 50 years, the site has been recognized by the public as a place where war veterans are honored for their service to the United States.
The Mt. Soledad Association manages the site where plaques recognize war veterans who served in the last century. Most of the veterans recognized are from the greater San Diego area.
Last November, two Republican congressmen from San Diego County, Rep. Duncan Hunter and Rep. Randy Cunningham, added a provision to an appropriations bill to allow the city to designate the site as a national war memorial.
If the citizens of San Diego agree with this proposal, the site will be maintained by the National Park System. The bill was signed into law by President Bush in December.
Representatives from the Mt. Soledad Association and the park system were in Washington last week to discuss a working plan to manage the site.
Opponents of the transfer, including the ACLU, contend it is illegal and unconstitutional. However, a lawyer for the Thomas More Center, Charles LiMandri, contends there is legal precedent for protecting religious symbols that already are on federal land.
While the debate on religious symbols on public land slowly is working its way through the courts, the proposition to transfer city property to the federal government will be decided by San Diego voters July 26.
San Diego Mayor Dick Murphy, who is leaving office in July, says "it may provoke additional litigation, but some things are worth fighting for."
Murphy was a supporter of a referendum that forced the city council to revisit the issue. The referendum sparked a record 89,000 petitions to request that the cross not be dismantled from its present site.
The initiative rescinded an earlier vote by the council that would have removed it.
The referendum, put together in just a month, was widely supported by San Diego radio talk-show hosts Roger Hedgecock, Rick Roberts and Mark Larson and Los Angeles host Paul McGuire.
Slightly more than 33,000 verified signatures were required for the referendum to be successful, based on a registered voter base of approximately 650,000 voters.
I think I made it clear that I consider you a time waster who attacked my intelligence without provocation. As Frist would say, go pound sand. I have no interest in speaking with you or meeting you at a FReep. Go talk to someone else and prove to them how smart you are. I'm not interested.
You are attempting to distort the meaning of the Constitution and the intention of this country's founders. According to you, the government-dictated teaching of the theory of evolution thus violates the Constitution as it contradicts the religious beliefs of American citizens.
The presentation of a belief, symbol, or teaching does result in compulsion. A person is not forced to believe in evolution by the teaching of evolution. A person is not forced to believe in God by the presentation of religious symbols. An atheist is no more forced to believe in God by the presence of religious symbols or expressions on public property as a Christian is forced to believe in evolution by the legislated requirement that it be taught in public schools.
The founders intended that the beliefs of the People would continue to be expressed by its government. It was evident in their invocation of God, the placement of Christian symbols, and their usage of Christian beliefs in the formation of our nations' laws. That is the nature of our democratic republic. Remember we have the right to freedom of religious belief and expression, not the right to freedom from religious belief and expression. The expression of religious belief was not to be restricted.
Note the portion of the First Amendment that is at issue: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or *prohibiting the free exercise thereof*...." It was not intended that the Federal government not express the religious beliefs of the People. Rather, the selection's original inspiration indicates precisely what was intended: "That religion, or the duty which we owe to our Creator, and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence; and therefore all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience; and that it is the mutual duty of all to practise Christian forbearance, love, and charity toward each other." The Founding Fathers considered the government of the United States to be essentially based upon Christian belief. It was not intended to be atheistic, but to be Christian!
Is a Christian not capable of being a Christian *and* a representative of the People of the United States of America? Is a government founded upon Christian beliefs not capable of governinng non-Christians? The overwhelming majority of the People of the United States are religious, though to varying degrees. Our nation's founders were also men possessing religious beliefs, though they too were diverse and varied in their public expression of it. To prohibit the expression of religious belief is to take another step towards divorcing the Federal government from the People and the Principles upon which this nation was founded.
I am so sorry, but there is something wrong with my computer. It must be infected with the citizenmike virus that I understand is going around on FreeRepublic. I clicked on your post, and the only thing that shows up on my screen is blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.
I think I made it clear that I consider you a time waster who attacked my intelligence without provocation. As Frist would say, go pound sand. I have no interest in speaking with you or meeting you at a FReep. Go talk to someone else and prove to them how smart you are. I'm not interested.
Only by actvitist judges and hyper-sensitive haters of religion at the ACLU. People with common sense will note that none of the three Lemon prongs are violated in this case.
If, as you state, "The founders intended that the beliefs of the People would continue to be expressed by its government" then what would prevent say, agressive Moslems from having the US gov express their beliefs and implement Sharia. I don't see how you can argue that the gov should express Christian beliefs but not other religious beliefs. I don't see any thing in the constitution that would allow one (Christian) but not the other (Moslem).
My first reply to you was in response to your post (and I quote)
"Sour Puss
Have you quite sucking on your Persimmon."
If this is how you respond to people having a genuine discussion then you need to be called out for it.
I'd rather be misguided than stupid.
"if the land where the cross currently stands was transferred to private hands, the issue might go away."
Wrong. The ACLU launches cases on the "percieved" or "possible" discomfort of atheists or people of other religions.
You put a cross on private land, and as long as it's able to be seen by people, you will one day land in court. If I can see it, I can sue it.
Why should a high school football stadium's 1000 people say the pledge of allegiance, mentioning "God," when that might offend the two atheists, three muslims and one hindu who might be driving by at 90 miles an hour?
You are aware of course that some people of some religions tend to get very selfish and brain-blind about these things? If it's going on, it must somehow offend them. Forget that they're in a Christian nation, founded by Christians, based on Christian precepts, and that is majority-Christian. If I were to go to Jerusalem, as Roman Catholic, would I have the right to complain about how I was a teeny weeny minority, and my religious sensibility was offended?
Before you launch on their constitution versus ours, know two things: It's very much like ours...because it was based on ours.
Welcome to my country. If you would like to join any of thousands of Christian churches we have, come on in! If you choose to honor no god whatsoever, we'll pray for you just the same. If you want to continue practicing a non-Christian religion, by all means, welcome to these safe shores--we lead the world in religious tolerance! (not counting Christian-bashing). And if you want to drop that religion and pick up a Christian one, fine. If you're a Christian immigrant or native born, and want to switch to something more attractive, go for it--even if it's nonChristian.
We don't care. We honor you. We have--and will again--lay down our lives to protect this fundamental right.
But don't tell me the shopkeeper can't have any "religious" holiday message, no matter how generic, in his window, because some pussy minority with no respect for the rights and feelings of others--yeah, some selfish little snot--is "offended" when he walks by on the "public" (therefore, the government) sidewalk. That's not where we're going--that's where we are. The ACLU has already brought such cases.
Next time, I won't hold back, so you can tell how I really feel.
Has anyone called you on stoking this thread as you have, and you've only been registered less than a week. Troll, methinks.
That is a non-sequitor. Any law must still abide by the Constitution and the Principles of this nation. While our democratic republic is based upon religious belief, religious leaders do not have the ability to dictate federal law. An Islamic community could lobby government to put up a monument bearing Islamic belief, but they cannot force others to follow their beliefs. Sharia is not established by the duly elected legislative representatives of the People, but by religious clerics. Thus, Sharia could not be *enforced* by federal, state, and local government agencies. Neither can religious organizations enforce Sharia with disregard to U.S. laws. Elements of Sharia would run contrary to the letter, intent, and spirit of our Constitution, thus it could not be upheld as law.
Incidentally, regarding the wording of the Constitution, the governing principles of our nation go beyond what some choose to recognize. It *includes* the intentions of our nation's founding fathers, and the spirit in which such words were written. Doing so otherwise would be to ignore context and definition, essential aspects of established law. It is akin to attempting to literally redefine "sex" and "marriage" to suit personal whims.
I have been here for eight years and have many old and new friends on this forum. You have recently come aboard and have been insulting to my friends and to me. I guess I will have to take my chances whether the FReepers believe I am capable of debating you or whether they will view you as an arrogant and condescending ***. It is your choice whether you want to be part of this great conservative community or whether you want to prove to everyone how brilliant you are. You owe apologies to some of my friends. Until that happens and you have an attitude adjustment, go play with yourself. I am not interested.
Sorrwee Mike. Wrong again. That was Doug's dismissal of you.
This is mine. Foxtrot Oscar.
How long you been out of the states?
That is not nice.....folks like you miss a great opportunity to correct miconception.....
I think one should put their best foot forward.....
That if you really care to build bridges!
Myself I would like to know more about NSR like which generation is she...boomer, gen-x, or y etc.
Why she feels the way she does about certain things etc
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