ontroversy continues over two key decisions handed down Monday by the U.S. Supreme Court pertaining to the display of the Ten Commandments on government property.

   The justices split on a pair of rulings which many hoped would give more guidance in determining when and if such displays pass constitutional muster.

   In a case from Texas (VAN ORDEN v. PERRY), the court affirmed the legality of a granite monument of the Commandments placed on the grounds of the state Capitol Building in Austin. Justices took a dimmer view, though, of framed copies of the Decalogue posted in courthouses in Kentucky (MC CREARY COUNTY v. ACLU), where public officials attempted to "secularize" the display with numerous historic documents.

   Bottom line from the Supreme Court: the duration of displays, along with "context" and the intent of those placing them in the public square remain key elements in determining whether or not such presentations are constitutional, or instead violate the establishment clause prohibition of melding church and state.

   It is, argue critics on both sides of this legal divide, a confusing and at times contradictory set of standards that serve to muddy the constitutional waters.

   "It seems as though they tried to have it both ways," grumbled Micah Clark of the American Family Association. His group has argued that displays of the Commandments serve a public good and reflect the nation's legal and religious heritage.

   "It was never clear ... what you could and could not do with regard to the Ten Commandments, and it is still not clear," complained Francis Manion, counsel at the American Center for Law and Justice. ACLJ, a religious legal advocacy firm founded by televangelist Pat Robertson had supported the displays in Texas and Kentucky, and maintained that the Commandments are the foundation of the western legal canon.

   The rulings leave many cases unresolved, and dozens -- if not hundreds -- of similar Ten Commandments displays throughout the country in legal limbo.

    ¶       Monday's rulings likely do not resolve the dispute over a Commandments "seal" for the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, Ca. The logo depicts a woman dubbed "The Majesty of the Law" holding a large book, with a stone tablet at her feet with 10 unreadable lines on it. According to the Sacramento Union newspaper, it has been the court's official symbol for several decades.

   Mark Rosenbaum of the ACLU for Southern California told reporters that the legal challenge to the seal is "a no-brainer."

   "It's an unmistakable endorsement of religion and says the 9th Circuit's law is God's law," he argued.

   But looking at the same seal, even in light of the Monday SCOTUS rulings, attorney Jordan Lorence of the Alliance Defense Fund sees an entirely different message.

   "I think essentially the Supreme Court is saying that the Ten Commandments are OK if it's in a context that has secular themes or secular messages, and it's acceptable if they are not overt statements of religious purpose by government officials."

    ¶       Within hours of the Monday Commandments rulings, a display of the Ten Commandments was removed from the Richland County Courthouse in Olney, Ohio.

   The presentation was donated by a local resident in 2004, and consists of a framed poster depicting firefighters, soldiers, the Pentagon, President Abraham Lincoln and the World Trade Center with the Ten Commandments located in the center. Slogans like "God Bless America" and "In God We Trust" pepper the display, which is hung on the first floor of the courthouse near the county treasurer's office.

   Richland County Board Chairman Dottie DiCiro ordered the poster removed, but said that the court should have permitted wider display of the Ten Commandments. "That's what our country is based on," she told the Olney Daily Mail newspaper.

   "If we can't display the Ten Commandments in our courthouses, how come the Supreme Court boasts a plaster relief frieze depicting the evolution of law that includes rendering of Hammurabi, the scales of Justice and two numbered Commandments tablets?"

   The Richland display, however, may be too weighted in favor of religion according to the latest SCOTUS decisions. When the poster was presented to the county , the donor insisted that it was dedicated to the victims of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks but added that American freedoms were penned by our forefathers "who asked for God's guidance in forming the foundations of this mighty nation..."

    ¶       All of this has legal observers confused, and some outraged that the court avoided (or fumbled) an opportunity to finally put the contentious issues of public religious display to rest once and for all.

   "My interpretation is that, unfortunately, the Supreme Court has once again muddied and side-stepped the issue," said Dave Silverman, Communications Director for American Atheists.

   While he praised the Kentucky decision (MC CREARY COUNTY v. ACLU) calling it a "good verdict," Mr. Silverman pointed out that "the Texas case conflicts with that and the court has not clarified this conflict. They have allowed one thing that is blatantly religious in nature and they have disallowed almost the exact same thing because it was too blatantly religious in nature."

   There is also the predictable speculation regarding new appointees to the high court which currently has several justices of advanced age.

   At Monday's Supreme Court session when the Commandments decisions were announced, the small army of news reporters assembled at the front steps was buzzing over the possibility of a same-day resignation by Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who is battling cancer. His resignation would create a vacancy allowing President Bush to place another justice in the high court's most influential position. Leading the pack according to court watchers is Justice Antonin Scalia who is often described as brooding, provocative and sometimes petulant.

   "He has mockingly read aloud the opinions of fellow justices," noted AP court watcher and reporter Nancy Benac. "He's penned sneering dissents that excoriate colleagues for 'feeble' lines of argument. He has badgered quaking lawyers."

   Worse yet, Scalia has staunchly opposed any rulings that support a robust separation of government and religion, and is the court's leading proponent of religious "accommodation." He is also an ardent Roman Catholic, and has even been linked to the semi-secret Opus Dei movement.

   The common wisdom is that if and when Rehnquist is replaced, a conservative filling the seat of Chief Justice would produce little change and simply maintain the status quo.

   No so, however, says George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley in an opinion piece published earlier this week in USA Today. Such thinking, he points out, ignores the fact that Rehnquist -- generally no friend of civil libertarianism and separation -- did occasionally cross the ideological divide and join court liberals on decisions which parted ways with his support for states' rights.

   As a result, with Rehnquist gone and replaced by an even more strident conservative, many 5-4 decisions could be jeopardy. Turley notes, "an unprecedented number of fundamental doctrines are dangling by a single vote," shifting even more profoundly the court's ideological center of gravity.

   On abortion, for instance, a single vote would "flip" partial birth abortion.

   "If President Bush replaced just two (justices)," Turley wrote, "he could deliver the holy grail of conservative politics for at least four decades: the overturning of ROE."

   Speaking of the First Amendment, he added: "A loss of any of the three (justices) would likely shift the balance in religion cases, allowing greater entanglement of church and state."

   The list of potentially cataclysmic issues and rulings goes, everything from gay rights and disability to federalism and the whole brouhaha over "states' rights."

   Although none of the justices has resigned, the salvos over Supreme Court appointments are already sounding inside the DC beltway.

   A group calling itself Progress for America has emerged with an $18 million war chest and battery of advertisements warning radio listeners that Democrats wary of Mr. Bush will "attack anyone the president nominates."

   The idea of such ads appearing even before a SCOTUS vacancy is announced is, says political science professor Richard Davis, "unprecedented."

   Televangelist Jerry Falwell is mobilizing his network of supporters for fights over Supreme Court vacancies as well. Democrats and others, he says, "are frantically calling on President Bush to consult with them regarding his replacement (on SCOTUS) and other judicial nominees.

   "Do these senators forget that President Bush won the November elections with a stated platform that he would choose conservative jurists who do not legislate from the bench? The American people elected President Bush with the clear comprehension that he would nominate to the court those men and women who reflect his values," he wrote in a newsletter.

   Despite confusing, even contradictory rulings, a shift by even one or two votes on the Supreme Court could profoundly affect the status of church-state separation in America well beyond Mr. Bush's presidency. All sides in the debate over the First Amendment know this. It is, simply, the lull before the storm.

[text only]