WASHINGTON (BP) — The U.S. Supreme Court’s 7-2 decision June 20 in favor of a nearly century-old memorial cross in Bladensburg, Md., appeared to some as a signal that the justices want to leave more room for religion in the public square. First Liberty photo The American Humanist Association sued the American Legion and local parks department to take down the 40-foot cross monument, which an American Legion post erected in 1925 to honor local men who died in World War I. A U.S. District Court judge in Maryland ruled the memorial could stay in 2015, but a three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals declared the cross a violation of the Establishment Clause found in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The case gave the justices an opportunity to clarify the court’s interpretation of the Establishment Clause, which prohibits the U.S. government from establishing an official religion. A case from the 1970s set a precedent known as the Lemon test, a multipart question used to determine whether government actions are in violation of the clause. The test, which grew out of the 1971 case Lemon v. Kurtzman, asked whether a reasonable observer would interpret […]
