…this fall, the court is poised to further limit our ability to hold elected officials accountable to this most basic provision of our Constitution. On Wednesday, the justices will hear arguments in Salazar v. Buono, a California case involving the erection of an 8-foot, free-standing Christian cross on what was previously federal park land in the Mojave National Preserve. I say “previously” because after the display was successfully challenged in court, our sly U.S. Congress simply deeded the small parcel of affected land to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, who apparently share Congress’ sentiment about such public displays of religiosity. Now, the nation’s high court will decide whether Congress can get away with such shenanigans.
So what? Why should Americans care about such cases? After all, the vast majority of us are Christians of some stripe. Yes, we are, but our government isn’t. The framers of our Constitution ”” many having witnessed the dangers of mixing church and state firsthand ”” gave us a decidedly secular state. The only references to religion in our nation’s charter are to (a) forbid its establishment by the government, (b) protect its free exercise by individual citizens and (c) prohibit it as a test for public office.
Nonetheless, popular culture has taken its toll. Listen to enough politicians and televangelists complain that the United States has betrayed its godly heritage, and folks start believing them. Just two years ago, the Freedom Forum’s State of the First Amendment Survey found that 55% of Americans believe that the Constitution establishes Christianity as the national religion!
In about 1934 (as I recall) some private citizens – the VFW – erected a cross on private lands using private funds. The stated purpose was to honor “…the Dead of All Wars.” The cross sits atop a prominent rock outcropping known as “Sunrise Rock†in the Mojave National Preserve, a tract of land which is made up of “1.6 million acres, or 2,500 square miles, of primarily federally-owned land in the Mojave Desert, located in Southeastern California.” According to the 9th Circuit,
[blockquote]approximately 86,000 acres of land are privately owned and 43,000 acres belong to the State of California. Thus, slightly more than 90 percent of the land in the Preserve is federally owned. The Preserve is a “unit of the National Park System†and is given “statutory protection as a national preserve.†16 U.S.C. § 410aaa-41, 410aaa-42; id. § 1(c). The Preserve is under NPS jurisdiction and authority. Id. § 410aaa-46.[/blockquote]
The Mojave National Preserve was created by by the executive order of President Clinton in 1994 (again, to the best of my recollection).*
Following the lawsuit of a professed Roman Catholic who wanted to erect a Buddhist shrine near the cross (don’t ask – the procedural background is very bizarre), the Department of the Interior announce it would destroy the cross (much as the Taliban would later destroy the Buddhas of Bamyan). Before the destruction, the VFW lobbied Congress and a compromise was reached – the VFW got the acre of land with the cross on it, and the government received 5 acres of land from Mr. and Mrs. Henry Sandoz. Oliver Thomas sees this transfer of land as a thin gruel covering a sinister and insidious attempt to force all Americans to prostrate themselves before the Pope.
His opinion piece is silly – this cross in the desert is not an Establishment of a National Religion; there was never any intent beyond commemorating the sacrifice made by so many in a time of war. This case is just a waste of time and resources.
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*Perhaps the Court should just declare the creation of such a National Preserve as not within the powers of the Executive.