$1 lawsuit filed over Everett's Ten Commandments

Seattle Times ^ | July 24,2003 | Jennifer Sullivan

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A national group that has spent the past decade battling to have a 6-foot-tall granite monument bearing the Ten Commandments removed from Everett city property yesterday filed a lawsuit against Mayor Frank Anderson and the city.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed the lawsuit on behalf of Everett resident Jesse Card.

Card, 20, is "offended by the Ten Commandments display in front of the old City Hall," according to the suit filed in U.S. District Court in Seattle.

"Everett's display of the Ten Commandments on public property is a blatant endorsement of religion," the Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said in a news release.

The lawsuit seeks to have the monument deemed unconstitutional and a permanent injunction forbidding its relocation to another public property. Card is seeking $1 in damages.

Card declined to comment yesterday on the suit or the monument, which sits in a flower bed in front of the Everett Police Department. The Everett Goodwill employee referred all calls to the Washington, D.C.-based group.

Everett City Attorney Mark Soine said he was reviewing the lawsuit.

"It's a historical monument; it's not there to promote religion, nor has it ever been our intent to promote religion," Soine said. "In our view, it was not put up to promote religion."

In July 1993, Everett resident James Hamilton, at the time a member of Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the American Civil Liberties Union, lodged a series of complaints about the tablet.

One of those complaints was delivered in emotional testimony during an Everett City Council meeting.

After listening to Hamilton, Anderson, then a city councilman, replied that he wished "everyone would stop by and read (the Commandments), because then we could do away with 90 percent of our police-department budget."

The monument was donated to the city by the local branch of the Fraternal Order of Eagles in 1959. Throughout the 1950s, the organization had acted upon an idea hatched by famed movie producer Cecil B. DeMille and a juvenile-court judge in Minnesota and donated Ten Commandments displays to cities around the country.

DeMille produced the 1956 film "The Ten Commandments."

In 2001, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal of a federal-court ruling that ordered the town of Elkhart, Ind., to remove a Ten Commandments monument it received from the Eagles.

In that case, Justice John Paul Stevens noted that the display, which referred to "Lord" and "God," was "rather hard to square with the proposition that the monument expresses no particular religious preference."

Staff reporters Rachel Tuinstra and Diane Brooks and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Card, 20, is "offended by the Ten Commandments display in front of the old City Hall," according to the suit filed in U.S. District Court in Seattle.

What a jerk.

[Principled]

Can the city just sell the land on which the monument is built to some citizen for, say, $1?

[goodnesswins]

Hey, I'll pay $10....I was born in Everett!

[Principled]

"Everett's display of the Ten Commandments on public property is a blatant endorsement of religion,..."

Besides, government is not prohibited from promoting religion in a general sense, it is only prohibited from establishing a particular state religion.

[Principled]

Call and make the offer!!!!!!

[nothingnew]

Hey Jessie, c'mere. I really want to offend you jessie boy.

FMCDH

[B Knotts]

I'd give 'em a sawbuck if they'd just shut up.

[microgood]

Can the city just sell the land on which the monument is built to some citizen for, say, $1?

I think someone tried that but they said something like it gave the impression it was a public display due to its proximity to the public building or some such dribble.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Here is a simple solution. Sell the monument and the city property it sits on to a local church for $1. Then it is PRIVATE property and Card can be offended all day long and there isn't a thing he can do about it.

[Blood of Tyrants]

And, IIRC, that argument fell flat, too.

[aimhigh]

..the Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State

Just like when Jesus was crucified, the persecution in America is at the hands of a religious leader.

[Big Mack]

I sure would like for someone to show me where in the constitution it says "you habe the right not to be offended.

I bet we could find more people that are offended by this organization suing than we could find that are offended by the ten commandments.

[RISU]

IN MY OWN OPINION, ANYONE WHO IS "OFFENDED" BY THE TEN COMMANDMENTS IS "EVIL", AND UNPATRIOTIC, AND A TRAITOR TO OUR FOUNDING IDEALS, AND SHOULD BE ASKED TO LEAVE THE COUTNRY.

EVERY SCHOOL IN THIS NATION SHOULD TEACH THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, AND EVERY PARENT SHOULD RISE IN ANGER SHOULD ANYONE OBJECT.

THE "SEPERATION OF CHURCH AND STATE" IS UNMITIGATED HORSE CRAP. IT WAS NEVER IN THE FOUNDING STATMENTS, AND IS PURE IMMAGINATION ON THE PART OF DEGRADED BEINGS PRETENDING TO BE "AMERICANS".

[onedoug]

Is he "offended" when an American Catholic soldier, dying on a foreign battlefield, receives the Last Rites from a government paid chaplain?

[LiteKeeper]

INTREP

[kazatzkeh]

Done in convention by the unanimous consent of the states present the seventeenth day of September in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty seven and of the independence of the United States of America the twelfth.

does that represent a recognition of religion? last time i checked "year of our lord" or "A.D." referred to Jesus.

[TheDon]

Some people are so intolerant.

[The Brush]

Wouldn't Jessie Jackson be a violation of a church and state law (if one indeed existed as many assume) Perhaps we should demand that he stop attempting to discuss politics.

[squidly]

Americans United for Separation of Church and State

Such a noble sounding name these scum have chosen for themselves. It doesn't represent their goals in the slightest.

[Eala]

does that represent a recognition of religion? last time i checked "year of our lord" or "A.D." referred to Jesus.

That's why you'll freuently see "A.D." and "B.C." now referred to as "C.E." (Current? Era) and "B.C.E." Neatly (in true politically correct fashion) sidesteps the basis for our dating system.