As you’ve probably heard, the Supreme Court handed down two separate decisions on the constitutionality of Ten Commandments being posted in courts. Nothing terribly exciting — basically upholding an older “secular purpose” test, and adding in a couple more details. One boulder in Texas (a promotional item from the Cecil DeMille/Charlton Heston movie) was kind of grandfathered in, while a couple of plaques in Kentucky were banned because they were obviously part of a recent campaign to promote Christianity using the state.

In my opinion, the relevant question should be: Who cares? We have a war going on, an enormous public debt, etc., and this is supposed to be a big deal? Give me a break!

Instead, this whole ordeal — the rending of the garments, the apocalyptic wails — is simply a set piece for the larger culture war, just like the “Christmas Under Siege” campaign we wrote about last December. I find it truly hard to believe that anybody’s faith is at risk when they don’t get to put up their sacred texts all over government buildings.

But sure enough, our modern culture warriors were shocked to the very core of their being:

[Family Research Council lawyer Pat] Trueman says the Kentucky decision is particularly ominous because of what it has established. “Religion and non-religion are on equal footing – and that’s dangerous,” he adds.

Trueman’s comrade at FRC offers a biblical metaphor. “The court came down somewhere between Mount Sinai and the golden calf,” says FRC president Tony Perkins. “The one case, in Texas, saying the display was okay; but in the other case showing a growing hostility – not neutrality, but hostility – toward religion, in particular Christianity.”

Let’s see — you can practice your religion all you like, and you can promote loudly in all manner of public forum. You can – successfully! – lobby this Congress to push most of the political views you derive from your religious perspective.

But when the courts draw the line at making the government institutionally endorse your religion, that’s hostility?

A few years ago, the culture warriors talked up the idea that “liberals” were too “politically correct” — so that, you know, conservatives weren’t allowed say things without offending us. Now, I hope, the reality is clear: culture-war conservatives are way too sensitive, or at least they’re faking it pretty good. And it’s not so much that anybody is diss’ing them or their beliefs — no, the real offense is when other people fail to explicitly recite their slogans. For example, when a store says “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas,” or now, when the government doesn’t specially, actively commemorate the Ten Commandments.

In a FoxNews.com story woefully titled “Commandments decision saddens Bible Belt” (you can almost feel the tears streaming down their faces) activists who sought, but were denied, this municipal endorsement indicated the dark places their hearts were in today:

“I’m heartbroken,” said former McCreary County Judge-Executive Jimmie Greene. “I’m devastated, to be honest with you.”

That sentiment was no doubt felt elsewhere in the country. Christian conservatives who believe the Founding Fathers saw the Ten Commandments as the basis for American law have been fighting what they see as a “hostility” to faith in the U.S. courts.
[…]
At the height of the controversy, residents of the two counties — both of which forbid sales of alcohol — took to planting blue-and-white Ten Commandments markers on their front lawns to show their support.

“They take prayer out of schools, they take the Ten Commandments down and they wonder what’s wrong with our society. It’s just wrong,” said Joe Kidd, who was working at a fireworks stand in Whitley City.
[…]
“There are consequences to this that people don’t realize. When you distance yourself from God and you say this nation can’t recognize God, you give up inalienable rights,” [said Roy Moore, the Alabama Chief Justice who was dethroned over a commandments boulder two years ago].

I believe these activists are sincere in their stated belief that the nation is morally “fallen” or whatever, and needs some churching up. But really — “devastated” that a courthouse has been prevented from commanding its visitors to avoid graven images, a commandment these activists are welcome to promote themselves any time of day or night? It’s not the end of the world.

Where it get really weird is in Scalia’s dissent, joined by Thomas and Rehnquist, which actually begins with the words “On September 11, 2001 …” (Reductio ad septembereleventhum, a rhetorical technique developed by Sean Hannity.) The crux of his bizarre “originalist” screed is that our government is not only meant to endorse religion over “nonreligion,” but that certain religions are allowed to be favorites.

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. … 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 three most popular religions in the United States, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam–which combined account for 97.7% of all believers [versus “of all citizens “—E.K.] — are monotheistic. All of them [i.e., the three religions, according to Scalia, not believers themselves—E.K.], 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. [refs. removed]

That’s right — as long as your religion (or more specifically, your God) is popular enough, there’s no need to worry about the First Amendment! (Come to think of it — Why bother with individual rights at all, since the majority must always prevail?)

Jack Balkin thoroughly and eloquently draws out the meaning of these new distinctions. “one effect of Justice Scalia’s theory is that he is willing to enshrine a notion of first class and second class citizens based on religion– first class citizens can have government acknowledge their religion in public pronouncements and displays, while second class citizens cannot. Well, who said that the Constitution prohibited different classes of citizens, anyway? The Fourteenth Amendment? Who cares about your stinking Fourteenth Amendment! ” (Read the rest.)

See also the learned discussion at SCOTUSblog, and this 2002 article by Marci Hamilton called “Ten Commandments in Court: Power and its Abuse”, about the totally obvious religious purpose of the tablets.