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Merrill Shapiro
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In a message dated 12/10/2013 3:08:29 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
religionlaw-requ...@lists.ucla.edu writes:
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Today's Topics:
1. Re: Satanists want statue beside Ten Commandments monument at
Oklahoma Legislature (Penalver, Eduardo)
--
Message: 1
Date: Mon, 9 Dec 2013 20:02:21 +
From: "Penalver, Eduardo"
To: Law & Religion issues for Law Academics
Subject: Re: Satanists want statue beside Ten Commandments monument at
Oklahoma Legislature
Message-ID:
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="windows-1252"
And then there's Florida:
A nearly 6-foot-tall
"Festivus<http://www.orlandosentinel.com/topic/arts-culture/holidays/festivus-EVFES1076.topic>"
pole made from empty beer
cans will be put up in the Florida Capitol this week as a not-so-subtle
protest to the recent placement of a Christmas nativity scene.
The mock monument will be erected most likely on Wednesday in the same
first-floor rotunda as a nativity scene depicting the birth of Jesus
Christ<http://www.orlandosentinel.com/topic/religion-belief/christianity/jesus-christ-
PEHST0165.topic> put up last week by the Florida Prayer Network.
"I still chuckle, I literally can't believe there will be a pile of Pabst
Blue Ribbon cans in the state rotunda," said Chaz Stevens, a Deerfield
Beach resident who applied to the state Department of Management Services to
put the Festivus pole on display.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/politics/os-festivus-florida-capitol-201
31209,0,1969699.story
Best wishes,
Eduardo
From: Christopher Lund mailto:l...@wayne.edu>>
Reply-To: Law & Religion issues for Law Academics
mailto:religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu>>
Date: Monday, December 9, 2013 9:42 AM
To: 'Law & Religion issues for Law Academics'
mailto:religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu>>
Subject: RE: Satanists want statue beside Ten Commandments monument at
Oklahoma Legislature
The result and logic of Summum make sense to me, but I?ve been a little
bothered by how far it?s gone.
For example... earlier this year, the 6th Circuit decided Freedom from
Religion Foundation v. City of Warren. The City of Warren had a Christmas
display in the atrium of their city building?a cr?che, a tree, reindeer and
snowmen, a sign saying ?Winter Welcome??put up by the Warren Rotary Club.
FFRF wanted to put up their own display, a billboard saying that religion was
nothing but myth and superstition. FFRF, predictably, was denied the
right to put up that display, and sued. (For the sake of disclosure, I should
add that I wrote an amicus brief on FFRF?s side for the ACLU of Michigan.)
Anyway, throughout the litigation, the City said that the cr?che was not
their cr?che, but that of the Warren Rotary Club. It was not governmental
speech, they said, but private speech. The City defended FFRF?s exclusion
by saying that their reasons were reasonable and viewpoint-neutral. This
was their clear and consistent position, at trial and on appeal. Their brief
to the 6th Circuit, for example, said things like, ?This cr?che is
accompanied by a sign that makes clear that it is 'sponsored by the Warren
Rotary
Club' and not intended to advocate Warren?s viewpoint? (appellee?s brief at
16).
So everyone was thoroughly surprised when they got the appellate opinion,
http://www.ca6.uscourts.gov/opinions.pdf/13a0049p-06.pdf, which completely
re-characterized the case. This was government speech, the 6th Circuit
said, despite the City?s own protestations. And evaluated under
Lynch/Allegheny County, it was constitutional.
I?m not even disagreeing with this result. We should have briefed the
government speech / Establishment Clause issues better, rather than focusing
on the private speech / Free Speech and Free Exercise issues. But we
treated this as private speech, because the City had conceptualized it that
way
the whole time?including the original letter that had denied FFRF?s request.
Litigators beware.
Best,
Chris
___
Christopher C. Lund
Associate Professor of Law
Wayne State University Law School
471 West Palmer St.
Detroit, MI 48202
l...@wayne.edu<mailto:l...@wayne.
