Sept. 3, 2003
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The secularists are gloating. They got a court order to remove
the Ten Commandments monument from the Alabama courthouse and another
court order to suspend Chief Justice Roy Moore who put it there.
But anyone who thinks this confrontation in Montgomery is just
about an inscribed rock and a defiant judge is out of touch with
reality. The Ten Commandments dispute is the tip of the iceberg in the
ongoing battle to obliterate every acknowledgement of God except behind
the closed doors of churches.
The goal of the secularists and the atheists is to treat religious
people like smokers. You can continue to exist only if you are out of
sight, out of hearing, and out of smell.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Americans United for
Separation of Church and State, and other anti-religious groups and
atheists have instigated scores of lawsuits all over the country
demanding that judges banish God from all public forums. The ACLU lost
its efforts to remove the Ten Commandments from courthouses in Kentucky
and suburban Philadelphia, but the Freedom From Religion Foundation got
a federal judge to ban a Ten Commandments monument from a public park
in LaCrosse, Wisconsin even though the city had sold the land it sat on
to a private group.
The city of Everett, Washington is being sued by Americans United
for Separation of Church and State to remove a Ten Commandments
monument from city property. It is one of many Ten Commandments
monuments donated to cities during the 1950s, '60s, and '70s by the
Fraternal Order of Eagles.
The ACLU has already forced the removal of the Eagles' Ten
Commandments monuments from eight Utah cities and has announced a
scavenger hunt to track down a ninth which the ACLU thinks exists but
can't find.
The ACLU intimidated the National Park Service into removing
plaques from the Grand Canyon that contained verses from the book of
Psalms. It was agreed that the Park Service can continue to use the
names of Hindu gods for some of the trails and canyon formations.
The ACLU got the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to let stand
a federal district court decision banning grace before meals at
Virginia Military Institute. The Citadel then announced that it, too,
would eliminate prayers before meals, and you can bet that the ACLU
will now target prayers at our military and naval academies and on
board ship.
The atheists and secularists are on the warpath to stop the
recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance because it contains the words
"under God." Atheist Michael Newdow was successful in the Ninth
Circuit, the ACLU won in Colorado, and we can expect similar lawsuits
in all the 33 states that require recitation of the Pledge in public
schools.
In Pennsylvania, a federal judge voided a state law that required
teachers to lead students in reciting the Pledge or singing the
National Anthem each morning. The animosity against the National
Anthem is probably because its fourth stanza includes the words "our
motto: 'in God is our trust.'"
Suing on behalf of agnostics and lesbians, the ACLU got a judge to
banish the Boy Scouts from a San Diego city park where they have met
since 1920. The Scouts' offense was that they include God in their
membership oath.
The attempt to remove God from all state constitutions is at the
heart of the Montgomery dispute. Judge Moore took an oath to uphold
Alabama's constitution which, in order to "secure the blessings of
liberty," invokes "the favor and guidance of Almighty God."
The silliness of the arguments against Judge Moore's Ten
Commandments rock is shown by the repeated assertion that he is trying
to establish the Christian religion. The secularists seem unaware that
the Ten Commandments predate Christianity.
When chief antagonist Barry Lynn was asked on television how he
could oppose the Ten Commandments monument in Montgomery when the U.S.
Supreme Court building shows the Ten Commandments on its walls, he said
that's different because the Supreme Court also shows the Code of
Hammurabi. But Judge Moore's rock likewise displays several other
quotations from historic documents.
The secularists and the atheists seek out judges who pretend to
find rights in the U.S. Constitution that no one else has seen for over
two centuries. The federal judges who believe they can make law, and
punish, fine or imprison those who challenge their tyranny, display
arrogance like King Louis XIV's famous words, "L'etat, c'est moi" (I am
the state).
The American people don't have to tolerate the federal judiciary's
totalitarian grab for power. When Congress returns to Washington after
Labor Day, its first order of business should be to use its Article
III, Section 1 power to pass a law withdrawing jurisdiction from all
federal courts over whether an acknowledgement of God violates the
First Amendment.
The solution is really that simple. It's not only perfectly
constitutional, it's Congress's constitutional duty to stop the out-of-control federal courts.
Additional Reading: Ten Commandments
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