WASHINGTON (AFP) — The US Supreme Court Wednesday took up the issue of freedom of speech and religion in a case in which a small sect wants to place its own monument alongside one of the Ten Commandments in a public park in Utah.
The sect, called Summum, filed a lawsuit against the small city of Pleasant Grove for rejecting their monument while allowing the Ten Commandments erected in 1971 by the Fraternal Order of Eagles because it had a historic value.
Summum sued the city for violating their right to free speech and lost, but an appeals court sided with them, ruling that their star-shaped monument had every right to stand alongside the other which it deemed of a religious and not a historic nature.
The Eagles had convinced Pleasant Grove, founded by 19th century Mormons, that the Ten Commandments monument was a tribute not to the Christian religion but to the Mormon pioneers who settled the area.
The nine supreme justices on Wednesday began hearing arguments from both sides involving the constitutional principles of freedom of speech, religion and the separation of church and state.
However, the questions the lawyers were peppered with showed the justices were reluctant in reaching an "all-or-nothing" decision on an issue they said encompasses freedom of speech and freedom from religious discrimination.
"It was perfectly clear that the city decided not to put up the monument because it disagreed with the message of the monument," said John Paul Stevens, considered one of the more liberal members of the high court.
"The tough issue here ... a mixture of private speech with government decision-making," said Justice Stephen Breyer, who also tends to take a liberal view.
Pleasant Grove's lawyer, Jay Sekulow, reminded the justices that the Ten Commandments monument was erected to the pioneers' quest for freedom of religion, and that a similar monument depicting Moses with the tablets adorns the interior of the Supreme Court building itself.
Formed in 1975, the sect believes the Seven Aphorisms as well as the Ten Commandments were given to Moses on Mount Sinai, but that he destroyed the tablet containing the aphorisms because he recognized people were not ready for them.
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