Democracy is best served by strict separation of...

Ok Fox, we are in total disagreement on the role of religion in the founding of the country, the interpretation of the first amendment, the fundamental nature of establishment, and the most effective way to run a government which provides liberty for its people.

But you're still welcome to stop by for dinner if you're ever in NH, we'll just have to talk about the weather or something

Take care,

rosborne,
the one thing i admire about foxfyre is that she is always undaunted.

Only on those things for which I believe I'm on very solid ground Wandel. There are some things I am still working out--I don't know what side I'll come down on.

But if my politics are not universally applauded, I think you and Ros and just about anybody would find my hospitality impeccable, and the coffee is always on.

what about sweet tea? I agree with you to the extent that I argue before I have even chosen a side. Many times, I never choose a side, and just agree with the opposite of popular opinion at the time. Makes for worlds of fun(and really bad looks) for me.

LOL, I have lots of sweet tea Hyper.

I think we can have opinions on the various pieces of a larger issue and it is quite reasonable to debate these even while we are yet uncertain how they will fit into the whole.

U.S. federal courts tend to be more strict on church-state separation when the cases involve elementary and secondary public schools.

This was illustrated again on Friday when a federal judge ruled that a Louisiana school board can not open its meetings with prayer. (In contrast, Congress and state legislatures are allowed to open sessions with prayer.)

In the Louisiana decision, the judge wrote: "In officially promoting a religious practice at its governmental meetings, the board is doing what its schools and teachers cannot do, favor religion over non-religion and endorse particular religious faiths."

In deciding whether the establishment clause has been violated, federal courts apply a three part test derived from the Supreme Court decision in "Lemon v. Kurtzman" (1971).

In order to comply with the establishment clause, the government action must:
1. have a secular purpose;
2. have the primary effect of neither advancing nor inhibiting religion; and
3. not foster an excessive governmental entanglement with religion.

hmmmmm...so, a lemon test is more than a childhood game to see what you can do with a lemon, with whom, and where. Unfortunately, the adult version is not quite as juicy

I don't believe that case had anything to do with prayer or the school board. In this and two other cases involving three schools in Pennsylvania and Rhode Island, the state was providing some state monies for books, teaching supplies, and in at least one case, a small percentage of teacher's salaries in three parochial schools. While it could be argued that the parochial schools were accepting children of all faiths, the court rules it illegal for the state to support a religious school.

I tend to agree with the court on this one. The state could argue that the funds were to help with strictly non-secular things like pencils and erasers, but the fact remains, a parochial school does teach relgion from a specific faith perspective and that does too much blur the line of establishment of relgiion.

Grants to faith based organization to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, shelter the homeless, etc. can be more easily separated from any religious activities of those same organizations and therefore do not, in my opnion, blur those lines.

(There may have been more than three schools involved--I'm working from memory here. I am pretty sure there were three similar case in those two states.)

I'm going to be watching this case closely. (Posted in its entirety as the NY Times requries registration and some would not otherwise be able to access.)

Incidentally AOL is strongly featuring this story today and is running one of their famous unscientific straw polls on this issue. Currently the vote is running 76% in favor of allowing the Ten Commandments to be displayed on goverment property.

The Ten Commandments Reach the Supreme Court
By LINDA GREENHOUSE

Published: February 28, 2005

WASHINGTON, Feb. 27 - One federal court upheld them as a symbol of the country's devotion to its legal heritage. Another federal court ordered them removed as an illicit message of religious endorsement. Fifteen months ago, Alabama's chief justice lost his job over them, and the two-ton granite monument that once sat in the rotunda of the state courthouse is now the star of a national tour. The profile of the Ten Commandments, it seems, has rarely been higher, or their ability to attract lawsuits greater.

Now, as with all great controversies in American life, this one has finally reached the Supreme Court. In two cases to be argued on Wednesday, the basic question for the justices will be: what does it mean for the government to display a copy of the Ten Commandments?

To those who seek removal of the displays - a six-foot red granite monument that has sat since 1961 on the grounds of the Texas Capitol, and framed copies of the Ten Commandments that were hung five years ago on the walls of two Kentucky courthouses - the meaning is as obvious as it is impermissibly sectarian.

"There is no secular purpose in placing on government property a monument declaring 'I am the Lord thy God,' " Prof. Erwin Chemerinsky of Duke University Law School wrote in his brief for Thomas Van Orden, an Austin resident who has so far been unsuccessful in his challenge to the Texas monument. It is one of thousands placed around the country in the 1950's and 1960's by the Fraternal Order of Eagles with the support of Cecil B. DeMille, the director, who was promoting his movie "The Ten Commandments."

"The government is not supposed to be for religion or against religion," Douglas Laycock, a professor and associate dean at the University of Texas School of Law, said in a discussion of the cases here on Thursday sponsored by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. "You don't put up a sign you disagree with, and the government doesn't disagree with these."

At the same event, Jay Sekulow, chief counsel of the American Center for Law and Justice, a law firm established by the Rev. Pat Robertson that litigates for evangelicals and other religious communities, offered a different perspective. The Ten Commandments have acquired secular as well as religious meaning, he said, and have come to be "uniquely symbolic of law."

Mr. Sekulow noted that the marble frieze in the courtroom of the Supreme Court Building itself depicts Moses, holding the tablets, in a procession of "great lawgivers of history." (The 17 other figures in the frieze include Hammurabi, Confucius, Justinian, Napoleon, Chief Justice John Marshall and Muhammad, who holds the Koran.) "Does the Supreme Court now issue an opinion that requires a sandblaster to come in? I think not," Mr. Sekulow said.

The Bush administration, which has filed briefs urging the justices to uphold the displays in both cases, takes the same approach, calling the Ten Commandments "a uniquely potent and commonly recognized symbol of the law."

Professor Laycock, who filed a brief on behalf of the Baptist Joint Committee against the display in the Texas case, Van Orden v. Perry, No. 03-1500, disparaged as "sham litigation" the effort to depict the Commandments as anything other than profoundly religious. To defend the Commandments as a historical or legal document is "to desacralize a sacred text, to rip it out of context and distort its meaning and significance," he said. "It ought to be unconvincing to people outside the religious tradition and insulting to those within it."

The debate over the Ten Commandments is reminiscent of the debate before the court a year ago over the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, which an atheist from California, Michael A. Newdow, challenged as an unconstitutional establishment of religion and the Bush administration defended as a historical reflection of the country's spiritual roots. The court never resolved the issue, eventually dismissing the case on the ground that Dr. Newdow had lacked standing to bring it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/28/politics/28commandments.html

as I understand it the issues to be determined are (1) context (2) intent (3) received perception (understanding of the observer) should make for some interesting law decisions.

if anybody needs any help please let me know. I went to Harvard and i am done with my cases (I wont give you my cases but i will help you out) just let me know if you need help

Foxfyre, re: the upcoming Ten Commandments cases, do you know what is actually inscribed on the Texas monument and or the wording on the copies in the Kentucky courthouse? On a quick search the only thing I could find was a statement that the monument contained a nonsectarian version of the commandments. How any version of the first four can be non sectarian is beyond me.

It's non sectarian, I think, when the sculpture itself is a work of art, not a religious mandate, and when the "Ten Commandments" are viewed as symbolic of the origins of law as we know it. Wheher or not you subscribe to any religious faith, the original code of law installed in this country was based on principles of religious law as understood by people of faith, more particularly the JudeoChristian faith; i.e., don't lie, don't cheat, don't steal, don't murder, be faithful to your spouse, etc. They were careful to ensure that the Judeo/Christian faith would not be required of any citizen, but the laws come from that tradition nevertheless. Would the same concept of law that is intended to specifically protect inalienable rights have been developed by non religious people? That might make an interesting debate.

At any rate, the vast majority of the pro Ten Commandment crowd are in no way wishing to force their religious beliefs on anybody, but are standing on a principle that history can include religious history/symbolism etc. without in any way violating principles of the First Amendment.

they need help, ahhs--debater. Don't ask, just give help.

yeah, sure Foxy. Your opinion is not a fact, contrary to your tone of voice. Here's another opinion.




Some of them claimed to be deists, but they were not Christian.

page 2 and 3 here:

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20050221&s=allen

I thnk you want to believe this writer is right on, Lola, but even a very cursory review of the Federalist papers clearly shows that the founders/writers of the Constitution knew that the 'enlightenment' came from their religious faith. It is no mystery either that the First Amendment protects the government from coercion by the Church and protects religious faith from any coercion by the government.

The eighteenth century enlightenment generally refers to the many advances in science and the writings of such philosophers as Rousseau and Voltaire. Madison, Jefferson and others were well-read in eighteenth century European philosophy. The constitutional convention's decision to omit any divinity from the U.S. Constitution was to ensure a secular federal government.

No quarrel there Wandel. And the purpose of the first amendment was to ensure that the government would never be able to deny the people of free thought, speech, and expression of religious faith.

the biggest question is...

do you deny the majority, or the minority, cuz neither will be happy in the end.