Reply #65: Madison and Jefferson would disagree

[Zomby Woof]

Just because YOU do not interpret the establishment clause as the "wall of separation" (as Jefferson deemed it in his address to the Danbury Baptists, as he was the author of the Statute of Religious Freedom in Virginia, the antecedent for Madison's draft of the First Amendment), does not make it so. 200+ years of jurisprudential precedent trump your 'interpretation'.

The crosses you refer to at national cemeteries are grave markers for individual soldiers, which is fine, because those soldiers were christian. Stars of David mark Jewish soldiers' resting places. And so on... These markers would be expressions of their guaranteed individual religious liberty.

The cross in San Diego isn't a grave marker for ONE soldier, it is a marker for ALL of them, and that crosses (no pun intended) the line from individual religious liberty into breaching the establishment clause. It's a fine line, albeit strong. It is doubtful that the cross represents the religious sympathies of every soldier commemorated there. One size does not fit all. The cross's reach exceeds its Constitutional grasp.

It is a typical conservative talking point to say "the Constitution doesn't say anything about separation of church and state!". Well, it doesn't say anything about the "separation of powers" either, but could you argue that we don't actually have checks and balances? Does conceptual interpretation mean anything to you? Does context?

Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell are among the biggest proponents of the lie that there is no wall of separation. That is because the wall is the barrier preventing them from achieving what they desire: The establishment of ultraconservative fundamentalist jihad-style christianity as THE state religion. I have followed Pat Robertson's career for years, (which was aided greatly by being his neighbor in Virginia Beach for a very long time - we even voted in the same precinct). I know what a dangerous sonofabitch he is, and I view ANYONE who denies the wall of separation between church and state with more than casual suspicion.