Summum: Freedom of Speech Case

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[Icy]

The Justices will be looking at a very interesting freedom of speech case this term.  The case is brought by a tiny religious group based in Utah, who wished to donate a monument to the local city park:

....in Salt Lake City, adherents of a religion called Summum gather in a wood and metal pyramid hard by Interstate 15 to meditate on their Seven Aphorisms, fortified by an alcoholic sacramental nectar they produce and surrounded by mummified animals.

In 2003, the president of the Summum church wrote to the mayor here with a proposal: the church wanted to erect a monument inscribed with the Seven Aphorisms in the city park, “similar in size and nature” to the one devoted to the Ten Commandments.

The justices will be looking at a new issue related to the First Amendment:

The justices will consider whether a public park open to some donations must accept others as well. In cases involving speeches and leaflets, the courts have generally said that public parks are public forums where the government cannot discriminate among speakers on the basis of what they propose to say. The question of how donated objects should be treated is, however, an open one.

The chief argument from Pleasant Grove City (who is also backed by 20 cities and states), which currently has a donated monument to the Ten Commandments in the city park,  is the following:

A town accepting a Sept. 11 memorial would also have to display a donated tribute to Al Qaeda, the briefs said. “Accepting a Statue of Liberty,” the city’s brief said, should not “compel a government to accept a Statue of Tyranny.”

The Summum Church has a much narrower brief:

“The government,” it said, “may not take sides in a theological debate.”

Find out more about the sect at NYT.

[Icy]

More on Summum, from their web site:

Summum is a 501(c)(3) and 170(b)(1)(A)(i) tax exempt organization incorporated in the State of Utah, USA in 1975. One of the by-laws and basic tenets of Summum is the practice of the rites of Mummification and Transference. In 1986, the practice of these rites was formally recognized by the Internal Revenue Service as exempt from federal taxation.

Summum first introduced the public to Modern Mummification in 1975. Since that time Summum has continued to research, develop, and refine this exoteric and esoteric art and science. Today, Summum is the only organization in the world to offer this remarkable and distinguished tradition.

Code:

http://www.summum.us/about/

[Icy]

Details and Briefs filed in Pleasant Grove City, UT v. Summum at ScotusWiki:

Code:

http://www.scotuswiki.com/index.php?title=Pleasant_Grove_City%2C_UT_v._Summum

[Icy]

Interesting article about one of Summom's followers.  Rather racy reading, so be warned.

From Coast News:

Code:

http://www.coastnews.com/sf/summum.htm

[Lucy]

 Excellent argument on both sides. Good reason for keeping religious tributes off of public lands.

 

[Icy]

Lyle Deniston provides an excellent preview of both sides of the argument at SCOTUSblog.  In his analysis, he says that the case is not as simple as it seems:

But lurking in those questions are multiple layers of complication.  Public forum doctrine, for example, now embraces an array of distinctions in how public spaces are used for expressive activity.  Merely calling a space public does not necessarily open it to all utterances. Similarly, how to define “government speech” is increasingly difficult.  What does the government have to do to make an utterance, in a public space, its own?

Running as an undercurrent in the case is another potential complication: how will the slippery slope argument play?  Will the Justices’ vision be fogged by a cloud of potential horribles? The Solicitor General’s brief well illustrates this argument: “Under the decision below, a city’s display of a privately donated monument to Abraham Lincoln could entitle an individual to insist that the city permit the erection of a monument to Jefferson Davis, or a group could insist that the presence of the memorial in [Pleasant Grove’s] Pioneer Park commemorating the September 11 attacks entitles it to erect a memorial to the terrorists who carried them out.”

Code:

http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/argument-preview-pleasant-grove-city-v-summum

[Icy]

Well, the Justices heard this case argued today.  One thing's for certain....regardless of whether they win or lose, the Summum cult has bought itself a heck of a lot of national publicity.

Dahlia Lithwick of Slate and NPR summarizes the case in her usual chatty way...easing the way for lay persons to cut through the legalese.

Jay Sekulow of the American Center for Law and Justice represented Pleasant Grove City:

Sekulow is arguing that the city's display of the Ten Commandments needs to be analyzed under "government speech" doctrine and not as a debate about the park as a public forum. Once you have entered the domain of government speech, the state may pick and choose among messages without running afoul of the First Amendment. The idea is that governments get to speak their own values, even if they can't favor anyone else's. And Sekulow says a donated monument becomes government speech the very moment the government assumes control of it.

Justice John Paul Stevens wonders whether just calling something "government speech" means you can reject any one monument over another because you dislike its message. Justice David Souter says if that is the case, the city's decision about whether or not to accept control of a monument on the basis of its message is "control with a vengeance."

Arguing the case for Summum:

Pamela Harris has 30 minutes to represent Summum, and Roberts hits her with the hypos: "You have a Statue of Liberty; do we have to have a statue of despotism? Do we have to put any president who wants to be on Mount Rushmore?" Harris replies that if a government wants to claim its displays represent "government speech," then it needs to "adopt" or "convert" the privately donated monument into its own message. Scalia wonders why the government isn't adopting the monuments merely by taking ownership. Souter thinks that if the dispute turns on formal government "adoption" of a monument, it's a "silly exercise in formality." Harris responds that it's not just formality. Pleasant Grove refuses to endorse the message of the Ten Commandments as its own precisely because it wants to "have it both ways," sidestepping Establishment Clause concerns, on the one hand, and eluding Free Speech problems on the other. Then she and Scalia do several laps around the speedway over what a formal "adoption" of a privately donated monument would even look like.

Read on at Slate.

Code:

http://www.slate.com/id/2204465/pagenum/all/#p2

[alaskan4alaska]

Interesting Case. This group has agreed to be hated by many, something that "real churches" won't do.  I am a religious person, but am against any public plaque or monument of religious nature.  The majority of Americans are descended from Church of England or Catholic backgrounds. Both of these churches attained "State Religion" status in some countries. They promptly outlawed other churches, often on pain of death.  Only Jefferson's "Seperation of Church and State" has allowed Americans to worship as we please. If you want to display a religious plaque, then buy or lease some land, set up your display and invite the public to come see it.
  The last thing I want is official approval of ANY religion.