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Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Court Hears Another Religious Establishment Case

Today, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Pleasant Grove City v. Summum. The case centers on the refusal by Pleasant Grove City officials of a request by Summum, a religious group, to place a monument in the city’s park. The park already contains a monument of the Ten Commandments (donated by another private group) and the Summum wants to erect another that honors the “Seven Aphorisms of Summum,” which according to their beliefs, complements the commandments.

The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the religious group, stating that the government cannot permit one religious organization to place a monument (of religious meaning) in a public park, but refuse to allow another to do the same. That, it says, would be showing preference to one religion over another. Pleasant Grove officials however, supported by several federal, state and city governments, appealed the Tenth Circuit’s decision.

Pleasant Grove City v. Summum is the first of what could be two cases heard this term that touch on legal issues surrounding the placement of monuments with religious significance on public (government owned) land. See our early post on the government’s request that the Supreme Court reconsider the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Buono v. Kempthorne here.

3 comments:

bluebluesdancer said...

I do not advocate promotion of religion... any religion... however, the 10 commandment monument is already in place so I am not suggesting that it be removed. What i do suggest, is that the 10 commandments are basic common sense rules for a society, and do not necessarily need to be associated with 'religion'. Therefore I feel that one monument on that topic is sufficient, just as one would not necessarily want two statues of the same military commander in the same park.

Unknown said...

bluebluesdancer,

Suppose I did not see the need for a second building with a tall steeple in my town, since the church I attend already has one.

Suppose I considered a document with five of ten statements pertaining to proper behavior toward the deity to be religious in nature?

Suppose I found your notion of common sense to be highly suspect?

Deb said...

Seperate Materialism from Spiritualism and we can solve nearly all the problems of all organized religions. You can't advertise only one faith and still claim to be a multi-faith country - nor brag about freedom of religion. Those of the Judeo-Christian-Muslim faith, (and not just 'fundamentalist', and especially Christians) are organized to limit America to one dominant faith, the Judeo-Christian. Their 'claims' to tolerate other faiths, is not thier objective. The objective of judeo-christian-muslim faiths 'outreach' is to con those caught in its web to begin, ever so subtley to practice the Judeo-christian-muslim faith. It is a con game. I think all laws of prostelyzing and advertising of faith should be scruitinzed and updated - perhaps totally banned.
Consider seperating materialism from spiritualism. Reverse and put an end to all Faith Based Initiative Programs. They do very little to help anyone but massively assist the neo-cons and their Holy Oil Wars. Carly Wilson's War wasn't to 'help people' but to cash in on war and oil for the neo-cons.