The US Supreme Court denied certiorari in Mount Soledad Memorial Association v. Trunk, which lets stand a 9th Circuit ruling that the cross was unconstitutional. While some have claimed this was a victory for church/state separation, the ruling was actually more nuanced — and not focused on Constitutionality at all: Read more
The Liberty Institute launched a campaign called “Don’t Tear Me Down” aimed at protecting military memorials. (While the push is new, the effort has been ongoing for some time.) The effort is initially focused on the Mount Soledad cross, but they accurately note the attacks on memorials could have a far wider impact:
“The ACLU is so driven to purge religious displays from the public Read more
President Obama’s Justice Department is reportedly appealing the case of the Mount Soledad Memorial to the US Supreme Court. (A similar petition was filed by the Liberty Institute.) The 9th Circuit court of appeals previously ruled the 43-foot cross unconstitutional.
The government should not be required “to tear down a cross that has stood without incident for 58 years as a highly venerated memorial to the nation’s fallen service members,” Solicitor General Read more
The Liberty Institute has petitioned the US Supreme Court to reverse the ruling of the 9th Circuit, which held the 43-foot cross on Mount Soledad near San Diego was unconstitutional. The 9th Circuit denied an en banc review.
Last year’s ruling by the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals capped two decades of legal challenges over the cross that was used for Easter celebrations in the early 1900s and later became a memorial to Korean War Read more
The US House of Representatives passed two separate bills (previously noted) related to religion at US military war memorials — a point of controversy for about the past two decades in southern California, at least. Though they’ve been inaccurately described as “promoting” religion, the first does little more than officially authorize longstanding tradition, and the second adds a Presidential statement to a war Read more
Update: Another California paper accuses the LA Times of being “too close” to Camp Pendleton in their failure to get an “obligatory” comment from the ACLU when they first reported on the Camp Horno cross.
An Associated Press article updates the protest by atheist Jason Torpy over the memorials located on Camp Horno, on the Camp Pendleton Marine post in California. It repeats much of the recent local article, noting a decision isn’t coming until next year, though its title is telling:
Atheists, Marines debate Camp Pendleton crosses
Even if inadvertently, the AP accurately notes it is a ‘battle’ between Torpy and the US Marines, not any other group.
The article also says Torpy is happy for the rest of the memorial to remain, just not the cross. Ironically, this seems to counter not only the concept of Read more
Some in American society today seem to think resurgent zealots are trying to push Christianity on society through their use of crosses, even within the US military.
Facts, however, show the long tradition of use of crosses as military memorials.
THIS SIMPLE CROSS WAS ERECTED at the western tip of Betio as a monument in memory of the 2nd Division Marines who were killed in the battle for Tarawa.
Crosses have been raised on Read more
Update: FoxNews reports on the “investigation” of the cross. The ACLJ has written a letter to Camp Pendleton explaining the appropriateness — and Constitutionality — of allowing the cross to remain. They, too, highlight the Argonne cross in Arlington mentioned below. In reference to the Utah trooper crosses mentioned below, the Highway Patrol logo has been stripped from the crosses and a disclaimer has been added in a bid to avoid their court-ordered removal.
It didn’t take long: When Jason Torpy of the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers saw the LA Times report on the Camp Pendleton cross, he was quick to call it
a “wonderful gesture” in remembrance of the fallen Marines, but said its location on public land “makes us feel like the federal government privileges Christianity over non-Christians like us, makes us feel like second-class citizens…”
[T]heir desire to erect a large cross to honor their memory is perfectly acceptable, so long as it is on church land or their own property, not on federal land.
Further, Torpy claims the Marines’ cross is an intentional effort to by the government to afford preference to Christianity:
Military service is being exploited Read more