Court to rule on city park's religious monument [SCOTUS Ping]

Reuters ^ | 3/31/08 | James Vicini

[kiriath_jearim]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court said on Monday it would decide whether a religious group must be allowed to put its monument in a city park near a similar Ten Commandments display.

The justices agreed to hear an appeal by the city, Pleasant Grove in Utah, arguing that a lower-court ruling for the religious group could affect whether cities around the nation must display privately donated monuments on public property.

The Summun religious group, founded in Salt Lake City in 1975, sought to erect a monument to the tenets of its faith, called the "Seven Aphorisms," in a park where there are other monuments, including one dedicated to the Ten Commandments.

Pleasant Grove rejected the request, citing its requirement that park displays be related to city history or donated by groups with longtime community ties, like the Fraternal Order of Eagles that gave the Ten Commandments monument in 1971.

The Supreme Court last addressed the issue of displays of religious symbols on public property in two cases involving the Ten Commandments in 2005.

The court in one case ruled that framed copies of the commandments in county courthouses violated church-state separation, but said a commandment monument can be displayed on a state Capitol grounds that also has numerous other monuments and statues.

The Summun group argued the city violated its constitutional free-speech rights under the First Amendment by excluding its monument while allowing the Ten Commandments.

A U.S. appeals court agreed and ruled that it violated freedom of speech for a city government to allow one group's message on public property while excluding another group's message.

"If government creates an open forum, it can't pick and choose among religions," said Barry Lynn, executive director of the group Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

But attorneys for the city argued that the appeals court's ruling will require cities and states to remove longstanding monuments or permit groups to display any monument in public places.

Led by Jay Sekulow of the American Center for Law and Justice, the attorneys said acceptance of a donated monument does not require "that a government park be turned into a cluttered junkyard of monuments contributed by all comers."

The Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case during its upcoming term that begins in October.

[TommyDale]

How about when the Muslims tell us that our churches are now offensive, and we must move them from our streets?

[tet68]

Gee, the reporter COULD have given us some backround on the “Summun” group but Noooooooooo.

[kiriath_jearim]

Reuters article mis-types group’s name: correct title is “Summum”:

http://www.summum.us/about/welcome.shtml

[gracesdad]

Churches aren’t on public property.

[TommyDale]

My point is that eventually, the mere sight of a church will be found to be offensive.

[Revelation 911]

http://www.summum.us/philosophy/principles.shtml

I personally am waiting for a Pam Anderson goddess monument

[Revelation 911]

“If government creates an open forum, it can’t pick and choose among religions,”

he’s right...once the precedent is set - to exclude any group would be arbitrary and capricious

[Domandred]

Eh not too far away. The mere sight of an LDS Temple offends some here at FR!

[TheZMan]

... Wow.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Summum

[messierhunter]

They are regulated by the local government though. For instance, you still must obtain building permits, observe zoning restrictions, etc. It's still the same in that the local government is choosing to permit or deny the placement of a religious symbol (or symbols as the case may be). If you're going to say that the government cannot permit the placement of a religious symbol, even when government money would not be involved, then that same logic demands that the government cannot issue permits to allow the building of a church with plainly visible religious symbols because it might be taken by some as an endorsement by the local government of a religion.

The only way to be fair is for religion to be given the same footing as everyone else in these matters. Is it an eyesore? Would you accept a similar donation if it came from a secular source? I think that is the appropriate approach. We either interpret "respecting an establishment of religion" to mean what it originally meant; that the government cannot establish a religion, or we take it in a modern sense to mean that the government literally cannot do anything that would "show respect" to the existence of religion.

[tet68]

Whoa, seriously wacked.

[Clump]

It is not "arbitrary and capricious" if the policy is founded on well reasoned criteria.

The case law here is very suspect because the last two Establishment Clause cases were decided when SDO was on the bench. She was with the 4 libs every time. Breyer broke with them in the Texas case to allow for the monument at the TX state capitol. But Alito would presumably flip the one where the libs prevailed, and give us a tentative 5-4 majority on most of these issues.

[Amendment10]

The court in one case ruled that framed copies of the commandments in county courthouses violated church-state separation, but said a commandment monument can be displayed on a state Capitol grounds that also has numerous other monuments and statues.

The Supreme Court is wrong about c&s separation. This is because majority justices in the 1930s and 40s shared FDR's disregard for 10th A. protected state powers, including state power to address religious issues.

This post (<-click), while addressing a previous thread concerning this issue, I believe, tells how FDR's 10th A.-ignoring establishment of Social Security, and other constitutionally unauthorized federal spending programs, arguably helped to create today's secularism-favoring environment as evidenced by this religion-related public monument controversy.