Ten Commandment challenges spread

The Christian Science Monitor

--- From Cambridge, Mass., to Montgomery, Ala., to Everett, Wash., state and local officials are scrambling to defend the placement of the Ten Commandments in government buildings or on public land.

In some cases, monuments and plaques depicting the Ten Commandments have been on display for decades. But now their placement on government property is increasingly being challenged by groups who say such displays violate the US Constitution's mandated separation between church and state. "The rulings are now mostly against the Ten Commandments. The tide has turned," says Annie Laurie Gaylor of the Freedom From Religion Foundation in Madison, Wis. ---


Rob Boston of Americans United for Separation of Church and State has a different view. "Religious and moral codes should be promoted by religious organizations, not by government," he says. "Just as you wouldn't want to see a giant cross on the Capitol building, you shouldn't create the impression that the government favors certain beliefs over others." ---

"Whenever we remove a brick from the wall that was designed to separate religion and government, we increase the risk of religious strife and weaken the foundations of our democracy" ~Justice John Paul Stevens