The courthouse in Jackson County should have to take town several copies of the Ten Commandments because they are an improper governmental endorsement of religion, a federal lawsuit argues.

The lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky and a county resident, Eugene Phillips Jr., seeks a ruling that nine copies of the biblical laws on the courthouse walls in McKee are unconstitutional. It also seeks an injunction ordering the county to take down the copies.

The lawsuit is the latest fight over copies of the Ten Commandments in government buildings in Kentucky, which has been a key battleground on the issue.

Maybe they just don't have phones in Appalachia. Or newspapers. Or literacy. Because if anyone in charge of running courthouses in Kentucky would bother to talk to anyone else in charge of running courthouses in Kentucky, then they would learn that you can't paper the walls with nine — count 'em, nine — Decalogues by themselves. McCreary County v. ACLU, 545 U.S. 844 (2005).

What you can do is dilute and debase the religion you claim to celebrate by insisting that the Ten Commandments aren't "religious" at all, but merely one among a collection of "important historical symbols and figures." "Historical" (i.e., not "religious"), "important" — but no more important than Hammurabi's Code or Magna Carta (understandable, given the pesky fact that only four Commandments have anything remotely resembling an analogue to secular law). Van Orden v. Perry, 545 U.S. 677 (2005).

It never ceases to amaze me how incapable theocrats are of recognizing the inherent contradiction behind their relentless quest to turn courthouses (and schools and … ) into churches. By stripping the Ten Commandments of its uniqueness, the theocrats actually hurt their own cause (i.e., the erosion of the Wall of Separation). Better a Decalogue be deemed puny enough for a courthouse rather than too sacred for a courthouse?

That, in their view, somehow advances Christianity?

More:

[Judge-Executive William O.] Smith said he had not seen a copy of the lawsuit but that most county residents would support keeping the Ten Commandments displayed in the courthouse.

Exactly the point — to anyone who understands the First and Fourteenth Amendments (which this "Judge-Executive" clearly does not). The First Amendment was designed precisely to frustrate "most" people (i.e., the majoritarian mob) and to protect the rest of us — all the way to Eugene Phillips Jr. — even if he is only "one negative person."

(Via Religion Clause.)

Previously:
–On the Dixie County Decalogue
–"Jesus Judge" Does a George Wallace Impersonation
–Activist Legislators: Better Five Wasteful Monuments Go Up…
–"One Negative Person"
–B.A.T. Archives: One Nation, Under A Generic Monotheistic Deity
–What Part of "Establishment" is Unclear?
–CRS Recommendation: The Law of Church and State

Faith organizations and individuals who view homosexuality as sinful and refuse to provide services to gay people are losing a growing number of legal battles that they say are costing them their religious freedom.

The lawsuits have resulted from states and communities that have banned discrimination based on sexual orientation. Those laws have created a clash between the right to be free from discrimination and the right to freedom of religion, religious groups said, with faith losing. They point to what they say are ominous recent examples:

– A Christian photographer was forced by the New Mexico Civil Rights Commission to pay $6,637 in attorney's costs after she refused to photograph a gay couple's commitment ceremony.

– A psychologist in Georgia was fired after she declined for religious reasons to counsel a lesbian about her relationship.

– Christian fertility doctors in California who refused to artificially inseminate a lesbian patient were barred by the state Supreme Court from invoking their religious beliefs in refusing treatment.

– A Christian student group was not recognized at a University of California law school because it denies membership to anyone practicing sex outside of traditional marriage.
…
"People seem to say that if you enter the world of commerce, you lose all your First Amendment rights" to free exercise of religion, said Jordan Lorence, senior counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal organization that has represented several businesses. "They … have become nothing more than vending machines, and the government can dictate the conditions under which they dispense their goods and services."

This is, of course, a decidedly libertarian argument. In Libertopia, all interactions, or at least all those involving competent adults, are strictly voluntary. There would be what the law calls "economic substantive due process," in the same way (and for the same reasons) that there is "privacy substantive due process" (e.g., Roe v. Wade, Lawrence v. Texas).

This is where libertarians tend to get into trouble. When confronted by non-libertarians with charges such as, "you oppose the Civil Rights Act" or "you believe in the right to be a racist business owner," we basically have to plead "guilty."

Of course, we also have the affirmative defense of asymptotic irrelevance. In Libertopia, there wouldn't be a Civil Rights Act because there wouldn't need to be a Civil Rights Act. Recall that Libertopia would be a capitalist society — and capitalism is always the first best weapon against bigotry. If you're a "greedy" businessperson, then you'll gladly buy from blacks, sell to Jews and hire gays. And if you don't, then you will suffer the punitive damages of competition — which far exceed those that could be imposed by any court of law.

So yes, on a strictly superficial level, libertarians would generally agree with the aforementioned laments by the bigots and theocrats. Point conceded.

But consider: What if the aforementioned litany of horribles had not been exclusively about gays?

– A Christian photographer was forced by the New Mexico Civil Rights Commission to pay $6,637 in attorney's costs after she refused to photograph an interracial couple's commitment ceremony.

– A psychologist in Georgia was fired after she declined for religious reasons to counsel a Jew about her relationship.

– Christian fertility doctors in California who refused to artificially inseminate a disabled patient were barred by the state Supreme Court from invoking their religious beliefs in refusing treatment.

– A Christian student group was not recognized at a University of California law school because it denies membership to foreign students.

Most hard-core libertarians would be unfazed in their support of economic substantive due process and its requisite toleration of such private discrimination in most of these scenarios. In fact, I would wager that libertarians as a group would be more likely to defend all the bigots than the bigots themselves would be ("Blacks are Christians; our problem is with Jews." "Jews are white; our problem is with blacks." Etc.)

The "victimized" Christian bigots are of course not making a thorough, comprehensive (i.e., truly libertarian) demand for full entrepreneurial freedom of contract — and its reciprocal "right to refuse service to anyone." All they want to do is discriminate against gays. Not "anyone and everyone." Just gays.

Which is precisely why they should not be allowed to do so. As I have blogged previously: Whether or not you approve of bans on private discrimination is not the point — we are not debating the creation of Libertopia.

The point is instead whether, given that we already have such laws, are we going to craft and apply those laws consistently, logically and equitably — or are we going to short-circuit the entire raison d'être of such laws by allowing the majoritarian mob to fashion carve-outs for the very same insular minorities who are most in need of such laws?

If the religious bigots really want to invoke libertarian arguments to legitimize their bigotry, then they better be prepared to be judged by real libertarians about the entire spectrum of libertarian issues — including separation of church and state.

Think they'll go for it?

Previously:
–On the ENDA-T Conundrum
–eHarmony, eCommerce and eBigotry
–Separation of Ice Cream Parlor and State?

That in and of itself is not especially problematic, in my opinion. (For background on Supreme Court precedent regarding such displays, see this post.) For better or worse, the book is part of American political history and should be afforded the recognition it deserves as a public, historical and strictly secular icon.

Yeah, right — in your dreams…

Whereas each one of the 43 presidents of the United States since George Washington on April 30, 1789, has commenced his term of office by placing his hand upon the Holy Bible and solemnly swearing the Constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States and to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States;

Whereas the Holy Bible is God's Word;

Whereas each President, after taking the oath of office, has repeated President Washington's petition prayer seeking divine help by saying, 'So help me God';

Behold the "wizened statecraft" of this pathetic simpleton. First and third, he simply butchers history.

It is simply not true that every president took the constitutional oath upon a Bible. If the illiterate cretin (or any member of his no doubt numerous staff) had spent more than two minutes on Google, then he would know that at least two presidents — John Quincy Adams and Theodore Roosevelt — refused to use a Bible at inauguration; Franklin Pierce affirmed rather than swore.

As for the Lie That Won't Die — that George Washington added "so help me God…" to the constitutional oath of office — suffice it to recall that the Lie was begun, knowingly and maliciously, by a Christian cleric. A lying Christian? It wasn't the first time, and it wasn't the last time.

But we must not let our shock and disgust that a Member of Congress flunked basic American history distract us from that second quoted "Whereas" — the one that seeks to declare definitively, as a matter of federal law, that the one of the countless versions of the "Holy Bible is God's Word."

I'm usually able to divine at least some part of the argument that the other side makes. Even Ken Starr's embarrassing blather during the Prop 8 oral arguments had some kernel of not-pure-insanity — something to which I could start my assault with, "Okay, I see where he's coming from and going to here…"

But this? It's "1 + 1 = 3" again. How do you refute someone proposing such a "Whereas" except to slap him upside the head? What could possibly work except to strap Forbes down and tattoo the text of the Establishment Clause backwards on his forehead — so that every time he looks at himself in the mirror he'll be reminded of his total and absolute failure as an intellectual, a politician, and an American?

Remember: Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty…

(Via Religion Clause.)

Previously:
–In Honor of President's Day: On Washington's Religion
–One Nation, Under A Generic Monotheistic Deity
–From the Archives: On Roy Moore on the Motto

It would work like this: Congress would bestow the status of federal civil unions on same-sex marriages and civil unions granted at the state level, thereby conferring upon them most or all of the federal benefits and rights of marriage. But there would be a condition: Washington would recognize only those unions licensed in states with robust religious-conscience exceptions, which provide that religious organizations need not recognize same-sex unions against their will. The federal government would also enact religious-conscience protections of its own. All of these changes would be enacted in the same bill.

Two hasty stitches:

First, I don't see "bestow the status of civil unions" — or, for that matter, "bestow the status of marriage" — listed among the enumerated powers of the federal government. The limitations of Article I may seem a frivolous irrelevancy to Blankenhorn and Rauch, but some of us still care about such things.

I remain adamant in my view that being a consistent libertarian and being a consistent full-equality-demanding gay are in no way inconsistent. I can make the case that the only consistent political orientation for a full-equality-demanding gay is to become a consistent libertarian.

Any approach to achieving full marriage equality that circumvents the proper role of a legislature is just as much an abomination as an approach to denying full marriage equality that circumvents the proper role of the judiciary. All else is rank ends-means Machiavellianism.

Second, as I have repeatedly blogged, in several contexts, there is simply no such thing as First Amendment "separation of hospital and state" or First Amendment "separation of adoption agency and state" or First Amendment "separation of parochial school and state." Why, exactly, are Blankenhorn and Rauch taking as an axiom that such absurdities must be conceded ex ante?

If we are going to have anti-discrimination laws — a noble debate in its own right — and if we are going to offer a "church and state exemption" to such laws — another debate always worth having — then such an exemption should apply to the church qua church, and to nothing else.

(Incidentally, if theocratic bigots have a presumed prerogative to refuse to accommodate me on First Amendment grounds, then do I have a reciprocal prerogative as an atheist to refuse to accommodate them? I can assure you that I find them at least as offensive as they find me.)

In short, as a question of normative statecraft, Blankenhorn and Rauch's proposal is a total non-starter. But what about as a reality-based strategic compromise? Gays get their rights, bigots get their bigotry, and non-gay non-bigots can stop hearing about it all the time.

The problem I have with that is the same problem I have with people, including gay and gay-friendly, who still somehow subscribe to the "too much, too soon" school of thought.

We have gone from a nation where gay marriage and gay civil unions existed exactly nowhere to a nation where gay marriage exists in two states, near-marital alternatives in five other states, not-near-marital alternatives in four others, and at least one state (probably more at this point) that recognize gay marriages from outside the state.

That's mighty bizarre "proof" that gays demanded "too much too soon."

I'm not sure what a "federal civil unions" compromise (and remember, this proposal is a compromise of our principles and not just our politics) accomplishes that continuing the current (morally superior) strategy —

• relentlessly demanding full equality without any exceptions whatsoever;
• relentlessly shaming, shunning and mocking zealots and ignoramuses;
• waiting for the geezer-bigots to do the world a favor and just die,

doesn't also achieve.

More thoughts at Below the Beltway, Hunter of Justice.

Previously:
–On the Supposed Impropriety of "Discriminating Against Discriminators"
–New Jersey: Are Civil Unions Enough?

"It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent national gifts. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support."
–George Washington, 1790

To review: Most of the Framers were Deists, not "Christians" in the modern sense. They were skeptical of many Judaic and Christian concepts, including the divinity of Jesus, the Trinity in general, Hell, Biblical accounts of miracles and other religious conundrums that perplex rational people with functioning minds. They certainly were not what today we would call "Evangelicals."

The one Framer who has probably been the most slandered in this respect is George Washington.

First we have the flat-out lie that Washington added "So help me God…" to the presidential oath of office. Never happened! Not a mistake or a legend — a willful lie propagated by Rufus Wilmot Griswold, a Baptist clergyman, in 1856.

Second we have the flat-out lie that Washington was an extremely devout Anglican. He was nominally an Anglican, indeed (probably to accommodate Martha's piety), but he was hardly "devout" —

He was a casual observer of the Sabbath and a semi-regular attendee of church — a little more than once a month, according to [Paul] Boller's review of Washington's diaries. For instance, Washington attended church four times in the first five months of 1760 and 15 times in the year 1768. Sometimes bad weather prevented him from making the lengthy trip but there's also evidence that Washington visited friends, traveled or went foxhunting instead of to church. One has the sense that were he alive today, he'd absolutely head to church, unless friends were gathering to watch an important football game.
…
While at church, Washington was "always serious and attentive," reported William White, the minister at Christ Church in Philadelphia during and after the revolution — but he never kneeled. More significant, Washington did not generally take communion, perhaps the most deeply spiritual act in the Anglican Church. In fact, he would generally leave services before his wife Martha, who often did take the sacrament.
…
Washington rarely referred to Jesus Christ or Christianity in his writings. He often spoke of God, Providence, the Great Architect and other formulations for the deity but only referred to Christ in a handful of instances[.]

The piece emphasizes that Washington was not a Deist — he apparently believed in the power of prayer and that God actively intervenes in human affairs.

But the Eighteenth Century equivalent of a radical Evangelical?

But for those who define being a Christian as requiring the acceptance of Christ as personal savior and the Bible as God's revelation, Washington, based on what we know, probably was not "Christian."

A good talking point to file away the next time you clash with an Evangelical: Since he was never "saved," is George Washington therefore burning in Hell?

H. Weishaupt after Samuel Moore
Apotheosis of George Washington, ca. 1860
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Previously:
–One Nation, Under A Generic Monotheistic Deity
–We Had to Destroy the Ten Commandments in Order to Save It?

Before there was bigotry, there was — bigotry.

And before there was blogging, there was — blogging:

In the meantime, Diamond and I wish all of you a Merry Christmas, a wonderful holiday season, and a prosperous new year.

–Which other local theocracy, meanwhile, is being sued for unconstitutionally pressuring a billboard company to remove an advertisement by an atheist group?

–Moving on to statewide theocracies: Which U.S. state quietly inserted into its homeland security statute a (patently unconstitutional) religious proclamation? ("The safety and security of the Commonwealth cannot be achieved apart from reliance upon Almighty God[.]")

–Going global: What was the outcome of the United Nations vote on whether to condone or condemn anti-blasphemy laws?

–Which senior religious leader is condemning the Walt Disney Company for corrupting children? ("Where once morality and meaning were available as part of our free cultural inheritance, now corporations sell them to us as products.")

When Gary Khera, went with his wife to the Union Mission on Roanoke Avenue to make a donation, a staffer asked him to remove his turban.

"She said, 'Sir, you have to take your turban off. This is the United States,'" Khera recounted. "That made me a little upset. I am a United States citizen."

Khera, citing his religious beliefs, declined.

The issue here is of course not whether private owners of private property have the right to demand a certain conduct on their premises. The staffer was, bottom line, correct: This is indeed the United States.

The issue is instead the sacred pursuit of mocking the mockworthy and never passing up an opportunity to expose religious hypocrisy or stupidity. A Christian charity placing mindless dogmatic formalism over its actual function, and doing so by insulting another person's religion in the process? How much more robotically brainless can people be? (Or stated differently: What would Jesus do?)

More:

The mission building contains a chapel, and employees consider the entire building "the Lord's house," Weeks said. A sign in the lobby outlines the policy against hats or other headwear inside.

I've never understood this "Midas Touch" attitude that some religionists subscribe to — the bizarre insistence that everything the congregants do must be done as if it were being done in a church (i.e., completely in accordance with all the assorted rules and taboos) or not at all. Doesn't confusing the charity office with the chapel dilute and debase the chapel rather than sanctify the charity office?

(This is the same argument I make regarding Decalogues in government buildings: aren't the theocrats doing the Ten Commandments a disservice by capitulating in openly and notoriously declaring that a Decalogue is a "mere historical symbol" no more solemn and sacred than, say, the Code of Hammurabi?)

It's quite simple really: A church is a church, but a charitable mission is not. Neither is a hospital, a pharmacy or an adoption agency. Either climb down from your altar-pedestal-mountaintop — or stay locked up in your sanctum sanctorum, pat yourself on the back for your God-fearing obsession with purity, and let the rest of the world get on with its affairs.

Previously:
–Who is "Shutting Down" Catholic Charities?
–On Compulsory Pharmacology
–Thou Shalt Have No Other Paycheck Before Me

"You can't run a museum if you have to accept everything, right?"

Right — Which is exactly why the government should not be running museums in the first place.

As for the outcome of this bizarre case, I think Chief Corky Roberts summed it up best:

"You're really just picking your poison. The more you say that the monument is 'government speech' to get out of the Free Speech Clause, the more you're walking into a trap under the Establishment Clause. … What is the government doing supporting the Ten Commandments?"

See also Dalia Lithwick's apocrypha:

Summum isn't before the court as a religion case. It was brought as a free speech case, and, as Jay Sekulow of the American Center for Law and Justice learns about three minutes into oral argument this morning, if he wins this case as a result of the court's free speech jurisprudence, he will be back in five years to lose it under the court's religion doctrine. The more zealously the city claims ownership of its Ten Commandments monument, the more it looks to be promoting religion in violation of the Constitution's Establishment Clause.

Sounds exactly right. Stay tuned…

Previously:
–Linkfest: Two More Decalogue Cases

Because of an editing error, the Nov. 7 op-ed column "Vows That Can't Be Voted Down" incorrectly suggested that the Mormon Church had contributed funds to efforts to pass Proposition 8, the constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage in California. The op-ed should have said "members of the Mormon Church."

That is, in fact, an important distinction — one that illustrates the impropriety of calling for the revocation of the Mormon Church's tax-exempt status.

The "Mormon" funding for Prop 8 simply did not come from the soulless cretins who run the cult — it came, pretty much in toto, from rank-and-file congregants. These misguided victims of Mormonism's lies are of course private citizens deploying their private wealth as they see fit and as they have every right to do.

The fact that the soulless cretins who run the cult ordered their local drones to read an edict to their congregant-victims instructing them to hypocritically oppose fair and equal for an insular minority doesn't change the analysis either, since the Internal Revenue Code only places limit on endorsing particular candidates and not issue advocacy. (The counterargument that LDS engaging in impermissible "lobbying" is also too much of a stretch.)

Court challenges are one thing. Public shaming is one thing. Invoking the tax code is another thing altogether — and doomed to fail. Those disgusted by the soulless cretins who run the Mormon cult should stick to what actually has a chance of working.

Previously:
–Is Planned Parenthood Violating its Tax-Exempt Status?
–CRS Recommendation: Political Activity by Tax-Exempt Institutions
–Theocrat Clerics to Stage Frivolous Tax Protest Stunt
–Tax Exemption Abuse Receiving More Scrutiny