The ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union, or more accurately, the Anti Christian Litigation Unit) is suing to have an 8 foot wooden cross removed from private property out in the Mojave Desert (http://www.onthedocket.org/cases/2008/salazar-v-buono).
The cross was built by the VFW in 1934, it is now a National World War One Memorial. The cross stands on private property, but is maintained by the National Parks Service, because it a National War Memorial. The ACLU isn’t asking that the government stop maintaining the memorial, they want the cross taken down, on the basis that it violates the Establishment Clause.
The lawsuit was filed in 2001, on behalf of Frank Buono, a former park service employee. In 2002, It was heard in the Central District Court of California. Judge Robert J. Timlin, agreed with Buono, and ruled in that the “primary effect of the presence of the cross” was to “advance religion.”
In 2004, Congress responded by passing legislation that exchanged a local plot of private land for the land that the memorial stood on. Since that legislation, the property on which the memorial stands, is owned by the VFW.
In 2007, a 3 judge panel on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, upheld the lower court ruling, and invalidated the transfer of land, stating that “carving out a tiny parcel of property in the midst of this vast preserve — like a donut hole with the cross atop it — will do nothing to minimize the impermissible governmental endorsement of the religious symbol.”
Then in the fall of 2008, the Bush administration appealed the Circuit Court ruling on the basis that the 9th Circuit Court’s “seriously misguided decision” would require the government “to tear down a cross that has stood without incident for 70 years as a memorial to fallen service members.” In February, the Supreme Court agreed to review the case. It will be heard this fall.
In support of the government’s position, the ACLJ (American Center for Law and Justice) is filing an amicus curiae brief. You can read Jay Sekulow’s (Chief Counsel for the ACLJ) notes on the case here. Along with this brief, the ACLJ will be filing a petition of support for the memorial.
The petition simply states:
“I stand with the American Center for Law and Justice in favor of the VFW World War I memorial cross in California’s Mojave Desert. I oppose the ACLU’s attempt, in the case of Salazar v. Buono, to meddle in private land transactions for the sake of removing a completely appropriate and fully legal memorial cross. It is crucial that no precedent be established which would inhibit the public expression of religious symbols.”
Please support the ACLJ in their effort to defend the Constitution and this memorial cross, by signing this petition.
Both the ACLU and their puppets in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals have been out of control for a long time. Let’s send a clear message that we will not stand idly by, while our Constitution is trampled by one lunatic with ACLU backing.
Please, I urge you all to sign this petition and pass this on to everyone you know. Let’s overwhelm them with public support for this memorial.
Once again, and in case the previous links don’t work, the petition can be found at: https://www.aclj.org/Petition/Default.aspx?&ac=1&Zip=*Zip&sc=3437