[at-l] Monday Humor

[ellen at clinic.net (Bob C)]

>"...Have any hikers been denied
their right to practice their religion?" asks Richard H....

Though the question was posed to someone else, I'm quite sure the answer is no. The debate seems to concern, mostly, a publicly financed judge in one of the former slave states and one of the states that continued to restrict black voting rights until 30 years or so ago, and when the state lost that voting rights battle switched from Democratic to Republican, for reasons I can only speculate about. 

Anyway. This judge persisted in posting the "10 commandments" of the jewish-christian-muslim bible,in his government supplied court room. Someone complained that this was a violation of the ban on religion imposed by the constitution.

As near as I can tell from the always fragmented press coverage, all the judges who have heard the case, so far, conservative and liberal, have thought that indeed it is a violation. There are other similar cases in which government property has been used to further, what some believe is the establishment of religion, but this is the essential issue: whether facilities, bought and paid for by all of us, can be used to further the religion of some of us, given the provision of the founders that the state is forbidden to establish a religion.

Weary