Amicus Brief Debunks Myth that Ten Commandments Are Displayed at Supreme Court
(Madison, Wis.) The national Freedom From Religion Foundation has filed a strong friend of the court brief before the U.S. Supreme Court, in support of Thomas Van Orden’s challenge of a Ten Commandments monument on capitol grounds in Texas. Van Orden’s case is one of two dealing with the Ten Commandments under review by the Supreme Court this session. A second Foundation amicus brief, in support of the Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeal’s decision against a Ten Commandments plaque in a Kentucky county courthouse, is also being filed.
The Foundation’s brief in support of Van Orden’s challenge notes:
“The first commandment alone, ‘Thou shalt have no other gods before me,’ reveals why it is unconstitutional for the government to display the Ten Commandments. Under the guarantees of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, our citizens may have any gods they like, as many gods as they like, or none at all.”
The brief (to read in full, select link at end of news release) observes that in erecting the Eagles’ Ten Commandments monument, “The State itself has thereby unequivocally endorsed the Ten Commandments–including those first four inherently sectarian precepts–as a proper code of conduct for Texas citizens. Judaism and Christianity thus bear the imprimatur of the State of Texas.”
Endorsement of religion, the brief pointed out, “is a vital interest of members of the FFRF, who are every day cast as outsiders, and often physically threatened, simply for disclaiming belief in God or expressing a commitment to the separation of Church and State. . . no one who would treat a fellow citizen with malice or disdain because of his or her religious convictions should draw the least encouragement from the official actions of the government. The endorsement test guards against the government’s participation in this evil.”
Significantly, the Foundation brief addresses the myth that the Ten Commandments is on display at the U.S. Supreme Court building itself. The Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in ruling against Thomas Van Orden’s challenge of the decalog on Texas capitol grounds, averred that: “A display of Moses with the Ten Commandments such as the one located in the United States Supreme Court building makes a plain statement about the decalog’s divine origin.”
Writes the Foundation:
“The Fifth Circuit has overlooked a crucial distinction between the representations of Moses in the Supreme Court building and the Eagles monument at the Texas Capitol. The Eagles monument bears the entire text of a version of the Ten Commandments, whereas the text of the Ten Commandments is not displayed at the Supreme Court.”
Moses is one of a procession commemorating the evolution of law, and is depicted on the Eastern Impediment with Confucius and Solon and symbolic figures. He is also depicted in friezes portraying 8 allegorical figures and 18 historical lawgivers. Muhammad is depicted with the Qur’an, and Moses is holding two overlapping tablets, of which only commandments six through ten, the secular rules, are partially visible and written in Hebrew.
The Foundation observed that “no reasonable viewer would understand the commemorative artwork at the Supreme Court to convey a message of endorsement of the specific precepts set down by all the diverse lawgivers from Hammurabi to Napoleon.” This is contrasted with the “unequivocal endorsement of the texts inscribed on the pediments, ‘Justice the Guardian of Liberty’ and ‘Equal Justice Under Law.’ “
This “crucial distinction” is between text and “depictions.”
The brief calls the Eagles monument “profoundly sectarian,” pointing out it displays the common “Protestant” (as opposed to Hebrew or Roman Catholic) version.
“The display of the Eagles monument by the State of Texas is not ceremonial deism, it is not a display of secularized nonreligious symbols, and it is not a commemoration of our legal tradition or heritage. It is, pure and simple, the endorsement of an inherently sectarian text, in a manner calculated to encourage adherence to its precepts. The fact that this display occurs on the grounds of the Texas State Capitol where it is surrounded by other monuments does not neutralize its sectarian purpose; it enhances it. The Texas legislature has used the capitol grounds and the monuments on it to express its view of what it means to be Texan. By making the Ten Commandments a part of that identify, Texas has made one’s religious beliefs relevant to one’s standing as a citizen, thus violating the central tenet of the Establishment Clause.”
The brief adds: “The Constitution requires that these monuments be removed. No citizen should be made to feel like an outsider in her own community simply because she does not share the religious view of the majority.”
