Supreme Court's review of Ten Commandments cases an opportunity for education on religious liberty

By K. Hollyn Hollman

Hollman Report
January 2005

When the Supreme Court hears arguments in two Ten Commandments cases this March, most of you will have the opportunity to discuss the issue with friends, family and co-workers. Disputes over such displays make headlines, and recently have dominated conversations about the role of religion in public life. While the media will likely present the usual caricature of a conflict between secular forces set to ban religion and religious forces eager to use any means available to promote their beliefs, supporters of religious liberty have an important role to play. We should take every opportunity to respond to the common mischaracterizations and oversimplifications that will surely fill the airwaves.

Those who rally around monuments in the name of protecting religion should be met with equally passionate voices from those who believe religion is best protected when the government does not try to do the work of the church. Here are a few suggestions.

First, when proponents of government-supported Ten Commandments displays argue that the Commandments are good rules for living, please tell them you agree. Certainly most, if not all, the Commandments enjoy broad popular support. The idea that religious teachings offer benefits to society is not controversial. Allowing the government to choose which teachings it endorses is.

The debate has never been about the teachings, but about who is the proper teacher and what is the proper manner of teaching religious values. Just because something offers a benefit, does not mean the government can promote it. The government can endorse many things, but thanks to the First Amendment, it cannot favor your religion, nor denigrate mine.

Second, many people will argue in favor of Ten Commandments displays because they want to fight what they feel is a growing secularism in our culture and a declining influence of religion. Again, many Christians will agree with the concern. But, fighting secularism through government promotion of religion seems a particularly weak strategy. Religion will not gain center stage in our society by relying on the government. As a pastor in West Texas recently told me, his congregation was quick to find fault with the removal of the Ten Commandments, until he challenged them on their own efforts to know and live according to the Commandments.

Forbidding the government from making religious decisions, favoring a particular religion, or promoting religion in general, cannot be said to be causing a rise of secularism. Instead, it is the very thing that provides an environment where religion can have a great influence.

Third, while most agree that religion has had a profound influence on the development of our country, claims that the Ten Commandments are the basis of our law promote a false history and a limited view of the scriptures. It is unquestionable that the Ten Commandments deal with our duties to God as well as our duties to each other under the law. They should not be reduced to their secular text. Moreover, government should not define the place of a religious text in our society.

Lawyers supporting displays of the Ten Commandments on government property will argue that they are simply one of many public acknowledgements of our nation's religious history, kind of like religious references in the Declaration of Independence. Others will argue that the when the government posts the Ten Commandments the intent and effect are primarily secular, ignoring that the actual content deals explicitly with the relationship between individuals and God.

These arguments make for bad religion and bad law. You cannot emphasize the sacred nature of the Ten Commandments and not conflict with the Constitution’s protection against government supported religion. In briefs to the Supreme Court, the BJC is urging the Court to articulate a rule that recognizes the fundamental religious value of the Ten Commandments and the importance of keeping the government out of the religion business. As our brief explains, the Court should make clear that the government cannot select a religious text and display it in a way that conveys an endorsement of its content.