Legal Commentary

A Possible Endorsement Test Case for the U.S. Supreme Court?

By Eugene Volokh

In today?s American Atheists, Inc. v. Duncan, a Tenth Circuit panel struck down the Utah Highway Patrol?s practice of allowing twelve-foot-high crosses as roadside memorials for fallen troopers. The practice, the panel held, violated the Establishment Clause because it had the effect of endorsing Christianity. (For pictures of the crosses, which included the names of the troopers, as well as the date of death and the Utah Highway Patrol beehive symbol, see the last three pages of the opinion.)

The circuit has 7 Republican appointees and 3 Democratic appointees among its active judges, but the panel consisted of three Republican appointees, including two in active service. It thus seems quite unlikely that the case will be reheard en banc. But five of the U.S. Supreme Court?s nine members seem likely to disapprove of the endorsement test ? Justices Scalia, Kennedy, and Thomas are on the record as opposing the test, and Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito seem likely to take the same view. So that might be a reason for the Justices to take the case, which doesn?t have the procedural complexities of this year?s Mojave cross case (Salazar v. Buono).

On the other hand, Justice Scalia?s latest extended critique of the endorsement test (in McCreary County v. ACLU (2005)) suggested that symbols that appear to favor Christianity might be unconstitutional even under his view, given his understanding of American traditions from the Framing on (recall that Justice Scalia generally thinks that historical practice is controlling in interpreting ambiguous constitutional provisions):

Besides appealing to the demonstrably false principle that the government cannot favor religion over irreligion, today?s opinion suggests that the posting of the Ten Commandments violates the principle that the government cannot favor one religion over another. That is indeed a valid principle where public aid or assistance to religion is concerned, or where the free exercise of religion is at issue, but it necessarily applies in a more limited sense to public acknowledgment of the Creator. If religion in the public forum had to be entirely nondenominational, there could be no religion in the public forum at all. One cannot say the word ?God,? or ?the Almighty,? one cannot offer public supplication or thanksgiving, without contradicting the beliefs of some people that there are many gods, or that God or the gods pay no attention to human affairs. With respect to public acknowledgment of religious belief, it is entirely clear from our Nation?s historical practices that the Establishment Clause permits this disregard of polytheists and believers in unconcerned deities, just as it permits the disregard of devout atheists. The Thanksgiving Proclamation issued by George Washington at the instance of the First Congress was scrupulously nondenominational ? but it was monotheistic. In Marsh v. Chambers, we said that the fact the particular prayers offered in the Nebraska Legislature were ?in the Judeo-Christian tradition? posed no additional problem, because ?there is no indication that the prayer opportunity has been exploited to proselytize or advance any one, or to disparage any other, faith or belief.?

Historical practices thus demonstrate that there is a distance between the acknowledgment of a single Creator and the establishment of a religion. The former is, as Marsh v. Chambers put it, ?a tolerable acknowledgment of beliefs widely held among the people of this country.? The three most popular religions in the United States, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam ? which combined account for 97.7% of all believers ? are monotheistic. All of them, moreover (Islam included), believe that the Ten Commandments were given by God to Moses, and are divine prescriptions for a virtuous life. Publicly honoring the Ten Commandments is thus indistinguishable, insofar as discriminating against other religions is concerned, from publicly honoring God. Both practices are recognized across such a broad and diverse range of the population ? from Christians to Muslims ? that they cannot be reasonably understood as a government endorsement of a particular religious viewpoint.

Perhaps Justice Scalia might conclude that this does not make the crosses unconstitutional, because in context the crosses would be seen as memorial symbols and not endorsements of Christianity as such. (See here for an earlier discussion of the subject.) But his McCreary County analysis does make this a more difficult matter, especially since one of the arguments for jettisoning the endorsement test is that the inquiry into whether a reasonable observer would perceive something as endorsement is so vague; replacing it with an inquiry into whether a reasonable observer would perceive that thing as endorsement of Christianity (as opposed to Judeo-Christian-Muslim monotheism) wouldn?t do much to avoid the problem. So this might lead him and some of the other conservative Justices to view this case as a less-than-optimal vehicle for revisiting the endorsement test. 

Thanks to How Appealing for the pointer.

Full post as published by The Volokh Conspiracy on August 19, 2010 (boomark / email).