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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Group to decide monument’s fate

Bob Anez Associated Press

HELENA – A state committee plans to decide today whether a 48-year-old granite monument bearing the Ten Commandments should remain on state property near the Capitol.

That and 13 other plaques, statues and monuments scattered around the Capitol grounds will be subject to approval by the Capitol Complex Advisory Council, which will submit its recommendations to the 2005 Legislature.

The question of whether siting of the Ten Commandments on public property violates the constitutional separation of church and state has raged for years. But the debate took on new fervor when the chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court was removed from office last year for refusing a federal court order to remove a Ten Commandments display from Alabama’s judicial building.

Controversy erupted this year over a commandment monument in front of the Flathead County Courthouse. A similar display was removed from the Custer County Courthouse lawn a year ago, after a six-year dispute.

State Sen. Mike Cooney, a Helena Democrat and advisory council member, said he expects no disagreement in the group over inclusion of the Ten Commandments marker on the list of approved monuments.

If omitted, lawmakers would certainly add the marker anyway, and legislative approval is almost certain to invite a lawsuit from those who consider such displays unconstitutional government endorsements of religion, Cooney said.

“Regardless of what action we take, controversy will follow this,” he said, adding he has not decided whether the location on state property is proper.

Council member Sen. Duane Grimes, R-Clancy, supports keeping the commandments monument.

“I don’t think that we need to fear some sort of court action, because I think Montanans genuinely believe the commandments should stay right where they are,” Grimes said. “It’s an important place for them, in the context of our state government that we hope is under God.”

A four-member panel consisting of Martz administration and Montana Historical Society officials has recommended to the council that the Ten Commandments stone and other existing statues and plaques remain on the Capitol grounds. The panel noted the monument was part of the Capitol area when it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

Sheryl Olson, deputy administrator of the General Services Division, said the panel considered the display a “historical artifact.”

The 5-foot-tall monument was placed by the Fraternal Order of Eagles in 1956. A legal analysis prepared by the Department of Administration in February said that “no existing records that provide any authority or detail as to the circumstances surrounding the monument’s acceptance and installation” could be found.

The lack of documentation and the fact that the monument is not part of a larger historical or cultural display make it “likely that, if challenged, a court would find that it violates the First Amendment of the constitution and order its removal,” the report concluded.

Scott Crichton, Montana executive for the American Civil Liberties Union, said his organization has no immediate plans to challenge the presence of the Ten Commandments.

“We’ve got a lot of commitments,” Crichton said, noting a pending lawsuit over the state’s public defender system. “We are concerned about stand-alone Ten Commandments. It’s not that we’re oblivious or unconcerned. There’s just such pressing demands on us at the moment.”