How does that muddy the waters? I pointed out that the statue in question was permitted by democratic means. People elected a government, the government created a National Forest Service, and the National Forest Service chose (in response to public demand) to allow this statue’s existence. kenetic asked me whether his individual desire for a certain statue also allowed him to place his own statue on government land, and I responded that it did not, because in a democracy one person’s desire that not control the government. The will of the majority expressed through democratic means controls the government. Similarly in 2008 the majority of voters selected Barack Obama as President, and a single individual who wanted a different person as President was simply out of luck.
The United States is a democracy. (If we wish to be anal-retentive, it’s a democratic republic.) Hence the majority should decide what the government does by democratic means, so long as those decisions do not violate the Constitution. The Constitution does not ban the construction of any type of statue. (Indeed, it specifically says that Congress may not place a ban on constructing any statue or other form of expression.) Hence the majority should decide what statues the government builds.
If the democratic majority chooses something different at some time in the future, then they should get what they wish.
As I already said in my first post, some democratic decisions are made through intermediaries appointed by democratically elected officials, and in this case the National Forest Service is such an intermediary. However, in this case there actually was an element of direct democracy as well. The Forest Service initially said it would destroy the statue, but public outcry led them to change their minds.
Free leases for religious idolatry on public land looks quite like an endorsement to me, and once the correct question goes before SCOTUS this will be gone.
Remember that free rent to religious groups of schools was judged to be illegal if it was not offered to other groups.
The cases cited in this thread as presented before the court have not been nearly as clear cut as this one, it is quite clear that this breaks the establishment clause.
So if public demand was for a flying spaghetti monster statue, what would be the problem? How many members of the “public” need be involved? Two or three? A local majority? A statewide majority?
So how did the Federal Parks Department go about making sure in 1955 that the request for a lease by the local Knights of Columbus had the approval of the majority? How was the will of the majority “expressed” in this case? Or, more likely, did a federal official decide on his own discretion to grant the lease?
There’s a missing linkage here. The federal government is indeed not banning the statue, but has contributed and is contributing resources to its construction and maintenance, i.e. the land itself. If the K of C wants to erect a statue, let them buy the land (and pay appropriate taxes and maintenance on it), and let other organizations who want to erect statues (even of flying spaghetti monsters) also buy land to that end. Or, if we’re going the lease route, let the federal government grant leases to other organizations. It would be unfair for the federal government to allow one request yet refuse another on the basis that some religions are more “valid” or more “popular”, which is what you’re implying when a statue of Christ is okay but a statue of the flying spaghetti monster is not.
It remains unclear to me that the democratic majority was consulted in the first place.
Public outcry is very bad barometer of democracy, I find. Since you already invoked the Holocaust in what I assume was an effort to get a reflexive emotional response, I feel okay in mentioning that “public outcry” (i.e. getting some people mobilized into taking action) is pretty much what caused the Holocaust, whereas sober constitutional protection might have prevented it. Consider roving gangs of Jew-hunting thugs given governmental sanction - “public outcry” given license.
Personally, I’m okay with the statue staying where it is. Just don’t try to dress up governmental conformity with Christianity as some kind of exercise in democracy, and don’t pretend that you wouldn’t seek some hair-splitting objection to efforts to raise a statue to what you view as a “wrong” religion.
The Constitution doesn’t say anything about churches, either. Does that mean the government can go around building churches for a particular sect? Mosques? Synagogues? Mandirs?
Perhaps it’s clear to you. It’s not clear to me. The Supreme Court may, in the future, do what you predict. Then again they may not.
It was expressed as follows. First, the public elected Representatives. Then, those representatives created a National Forest Service and staffed it. Then, someone in the staff of the National Forest Service chose to permit the statue. Since the federal government has millions of employees but only 535 Congress-critters, it’s safe to say that most decisions are made by federal officials deciding in a similar manner. Having an election for every single decision that anyone in the federal government makes is a practical impossibility. It seems to me that all of this should be fairly obvious.
Our country is not governed by your definition of fairness. While the Constitution certainly grants all individuals equality before the law, it does not grant all groups of any size equal participation in the government’s decision-making process. In situations where those holding one position outnumber those holding a contrary position, the first group wins out. For example, those voting for Barack Obama outnumbered those voting for John McCain in 2008, so Obama became President and the pro-McCain voters got no say in the presidency. That’s how democracy works. You may find it unfair and that’s your opinion, but the government is not obliged to care about your opinion on fairness.
Emphasis added. Yes, a government employee made this decision. Could a government employee also have made the decision to grant a lease and permit a statue of the flying spaghetti monster, or Satan? Are you okay with a government employee doing so, or is the employee allowed to play favourites and only permit the statues that he finds acceptable?
Oh, okay… if there’s no problem then this whole foray into what comprises a “democratic majority” has been a waste of time, then.
It’s not my standards that are being violated, but those of your own Constitution. The Jesus statue was not put to a vote, its erection in that particular place was the result of an arbitrary decision by one official. Sure, there’s a democratic framework in place that put that official in that position to make that decision, but if that’s the standard, any action by a government official is similarly “democratic”, even ones that far more blatantly infringe on civil rights. The cops want to give a guy a beating? It’s cool - the cops were hired by government officials who were appointed by elected officials who were elected democratically, therefore it’s the will of the people that the suspect get “tuned up.”
Good catch - I must have missed those cases where the ACLU pursued cases involving private property. That is, aside from the ones where they were defending the right to private property.
That brings us right back to what I posted earlier:
There’s great benefit to a system that protects people’s basic rights, but no basic rights are at issue in this case. The existence of a statue does not violate anyone’s basic rights. If you can find any passage in the Constitution that says “All individuals shall have the right to destroy any statue which they do not like” (or words to that effect) then I will agree that you have a basic right to destroy this statue, but otherwise I will not.
(The action of a cop beating someone is not comparable to the action of building a statue of Jesus, because the former is prohibited by the Constitution–8th Amendment–while the later is not.)
And they did - they pursued it through the court system. Unfortunately, it’ll be a while yet before religion’s hold on America weakens enough that this course of action approaches the ideal laid out in the U.S. Bill of Rights.
Again, huh? Have I ever said said that the First Amendment is not in effect? On the contrary, I’ve said that I’m strongly in favor of the First Amendment. As I’ve said twice, if you can quote me a portion of the First Amendment (or any other part of the Constitution) which says “all individuals shall have the right to destroy any statue which they do not like” (or words to that effect) then I will agree with you that this statue should be destroyed. So far, no one’s posted a quote from the Constitution which says that.
It’ll be a while before an American court says “Duh, of course this is improper” rather than finding some hairsplitting excuse like “historical significance” or “ceremonial deism”.
The issue is that the statue shouldn’t have been erected on government property in the first place and removing it corrects this error, not some defense of vandalism or whatever it is you’re on about. It’s an argument for a limitation on government, not for the empowerment of individuals, or at least that individuals should not be empowered with government help on issues the government is specifically prohibited from interfering with.
