Courthouse lawn not 'private' land

Knox County Councilman George Lane has proposed a solution to prevent a court battle over displaying the Ten Commandments on the courthouse square in Vincennes. \nUnfortunately, his solution is to deed the small area of land on which the monument sits to a private nonprofit organization, legally making the land private, not public. The Indiana Civil Liberties Union announced its intentions to sue last week. \nThis solution is an underhanded, devious way of avoiding the real issue at hand: the establishment clause, part of the First Amendment that prevents the government from establishing a religion or preventing citizens from exercising theirs.\nThe establishment clause was made a part of the Constitution because the founders of this country were hoping to avoid the religious persecution they experienced before coming to America. By preventing the nation from establishing a national religion, this clause gives everyone the right to choose his or her own religion.\nCouncilman Lane's proposed solution skirts this establishment clause and creeps toward the approval of a Judeo-Christian religion as the preferred national faith. While Vincennes' population is largely Judeo-Christian, the Constitution exists to protect the rights of a minority from the tyranny of the majority. \nLane admits this is a cynical attempt to avoid a potentially costly and drawn-out legal battle with the Indiana Civil Liberties Union, the group trying to force Knox County to remove the commandments from its courthouse lawn. But this could start a slippery slope of public land usage. \nWhat is most disturbing about this situation is the fact that Lane hopes his actions will be a catalyst for a nationwide movement. If this type of arrangement is held to be legal, and other counties follow suit, almost anything could be displayed on public land. Worries about nativity scenes at Christmas would be a thing of the past: simply deed the land to a community church and all of a sudden part of the courthouse lawn is no longer public land.\nDefenders of the monument claim it is a harmless landmark, standing in the square since 1958. If no one has complained about it since then, they say, why should it be torn down?\nBut the ICLU said it has received complaints, and this is part of the reason it is pushing to have it removed. And the ICLU has won similar court battles over Ten Commandment postings in Indianapolis and Elkhart. Lane is fighting an uphill battle against a Constitutional clause that has been supported by the courts.\nWhile some might commend Lane for his clever "thinking outside the box," this attempt to avoid the establishment clause is in fact deplorable.\nMerely deeding the small plot of land does not change the fact that a document that is intrinsically religious is being displayed on the lawn of a public building.