10 Commandments + 7 Aphorisms = 1?

The Supreme Court heard oral arguments today on the case of Pleasant Grove City v. Summum. The issue surrounding this case is if Pleasant Grove City allows a monument with the Ten Commandments to be erected in a public park, must it also allow other religious groups to display comparable monuments based on their belief systems?

Jay Sekulow, Petitioner on behalf of Pleasant Grove City, argues that this is not a “public forum” case but a “government speech” case. “The government itself is permanently displaying the Ten Commandments in a government-owned and government-controlled park,” Sekulow said. Sekulow went on to say that Summum has no constitutional “right to impose a monument’ on the city. Sekulow says that by siding with Summum, municipalities all over the country would be constitutionally obligated to accept any and every donated monument, no matter what it memorialized or commemorated.

Pamela Harris, Respondent for Summum, argued that this is not a “government speech” case but a “public forum” case. “Summum relies on the First Amendment case law establishing beyond peradeventure that a public park is a traditional or quintessential public forum,” Harris said. Harris argued that Summum insists that these precedents do not allow the city to practice content-discrimination or speaker-discrimination. Harris went on to say that “if Pleasant Grove permitted the Faternal Order of the Eagles to conduct a prayer rally or revival extolling the Ten Commandments in the park, then the city would be obliged to permit Summum to conduct a transcending meditation or a rally extolling the Seven Aphorisms.” Because of this, Summum argued, permanent monuments must be provided the same equal treatment.