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Justices to hear Pleasant Grove tablets case: Top court to decide city's monument dispute

What influence has Summum had in the founding of this country? The Ten Commandments, and its implications of the existence of a supreme being, are universal and dominant in defining moral behavior, the root of law. Displaying the Seven Aphorisms in the public square would be nothing more than an advertisement, akin to displaying the Thirteen Articles of Faith.

This is an attempt to get rid of all public displays of the Ten Commandments.
"In response, Summum said government bodies always have the option of banning display of all privately donated monuments."
Of course they did, that is their actual goal.

Thank heaven for Brian Barnard.

To Liberal Larry: "heaven" was the wrong choice of words. Brian Barnard is making a living by seeking to separate State from God. If you take God out of our country, you take good out, as well.

yes, I'm sure God would be very pleased with Brian's campaign to remove any reference to God from all public forums.

I'm tired of religious groups assuming everyone in the community thinks as they do. Why do we need constant reminders not to steal and murder. Do the people violating these 10 commandments stop their bad behavior when they see these signs? Let's keep your ideologies in your own head not on public lawns.

Because of the nature of this case before the Supreme Court, and the fact that it so closely approximates a number of cases already ruled on throughout the nation, it was only a matter of time before a non-Christian religious case actually based on the same premise as those early cases would come before the court... and guess what? The courts will ultimately have to rule in favor of Summum, because that's the precedent that is in place.

They're simply playing the same exact card as the Christians have so successfully done, so I guess the fat lady has come home to roost and as the saying goes... "Time to pay the Fat Lady for her song."

What Pleasant Grove should do is determine the most non-visual part of the park to place the monument and surround it with a bunch of high fence-type bushes... as that's something the courts have no jurisdiction over, but is the sole privilege of the park's managers.

Well said. Constant reminders do little to influence a person's behavior. We fine people or put them in jail as punishment, not tell them they're going to go to hell and then release them. Let religion do its thing, but civic law should remain outside it's influence. By the way, the Ten Commandments are based on much older laws that the Hebrews simply adapted to their own purposes.

To Charles: I think you are a bit confused as to the basic argument, Charles. Understanding that God flows through everything and always will, I am afraid you knowingly or unknowingly are attempting to separate yourself and your group, mistakenly believing you are "closer to God than other people" and the zealots from the far-right are playing you for a chump.

You've missed the point of this entirely. It's not about religious groups trying to impose their standards on others, it's about being able to put a monument with any religious reference whatsoever on public land. If we were to adopt the policy advocated by Summum that government bodies ban the display of all privately donated monuments (which is Summum's goal here), most of the monuments at Gettysburg and every other memorial site would have to be removed.

While it is true that people should keep their religious ideologies to themselves, it does not change the fact that the country was founded on the 10 commandments. Every courtroom within the Supreme Court in D.C. has the 10 Commandments posted on the wall. As you enter the courthouse, a statue of Moses with the 10 Commandments is on the mantle over the door, with 10 other statues facing him. I've never understood why people look at the 10 Commandments with such disdain. Although they stem from the Christian Holy Bible, they apply to all sects and non-religious people. They promote proper behavior, and create law. I'm not of the Buddhist faith, but I view their laws of conservatism to be good principles to live by. Religious tolerance is something this country greatly needs, and we need to overlook the religious boundaries and accept teachings and principles as just that: moral laws to live by.

Interseting that an 80 year-old church deacon of a catholic church was forcibly removed from a mall for wearing a shirt that stated, "4000 troops and 1 million Iraqis dead, ENOUGH."
Who decides who's opinions are valid? Who actually resides as the speech police?

The Ten Commandments should be posted in all courtrooms. And the U.S. Constitution should be glued onto Jesus' chest in every church in America.
(just kidding, but we all know there are those zealots out there today that would want this)

I wonder how the "Supreme Court can change the interpretation of the [First] ammendment"? It's pretty clear: "Congress (nor the enlightened Pleasant Grove city council) shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, nor prohibiting the free exercise thereof, nor abridging freedom of speech." So what sort of legal neocon doublethink are the so-called "textualists" like Justice Scalia going to manifest as justification for why public property can be used for the exercise of one type of religion, but not the other? Especially when the type of speech exactly the same?

To Charles @ 8:06, and others: If you feel strongly that religion is a thing of importance then you would actually want to be on the side of Summum in this disbute. A decsion against them would weakend the First Ammendment, the portion of the Constitution that protects the right to worship as you choose, and also prevents the government from endorsing one religion to the detriment of another. Think of it in a more familiar context: it would be illegal to allow Jehovah's Witnesses but prohibit Mormon missionaries to knock on doors in a particular town. Remember 1st Ammendment = religious liberty, not the other way around.

This is just more far-right hysterics from a group of people afraid of their own shadows.

These people will do ANYTHING to set themselves apart from the rest tryint to convince the world (and themselves) that the demon liberals (aka Democrats) are out to bring the devil into everyone's lives. This is nothing new. Every now and then this sort of thing crops up in history.

What utter, lunatic nonsense!

This should be about the easiest judgement the supremes have ever had to make. All they need to do is look at the front of their building as they walk in. Case closed.

When the first commandment instructs us to have no other gods before Him, exactly which god gets top billing?

A local community should be able to decide what monuments to display in their public park without requiring an act of congress. And, no, just because a monument contains a religious reference doesn't mean that every conceivable religion then must be represented.

Hopefully, the U.S Supreme Court will be able to find some middle ground between the so called "religious zealots" and the religious bigots.

The Supreme Court use just use their own building as an example of how to rule.

At the laying of the cornerstone for the U.S. Supreme Court Building on October 13, 1932, Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes stated, "The Republic endures and this is the symbol of its faith." A sculpture group by Herman A. McNeil is located above the east entrance that represents great lawgivers, Moses, Confucius, and Solon.

Note: Religious reference, but not every conceivable religion represented.