";s:4:"text";s:5287:" Contact: Sam Gerard, sgerard@americanhumanist.org, 202-238-9088×105 (Washington, DC, June 30, 2020) – Leaders at the American Humanist Association (AHA) lambasted today’s 5-to-4 Supreme Court ruling in Espinoza v.Montana Department of Revenue favoring the further use of public funds for sectarian purposes. Today, the Court explains that the plaintiffs are not entitled to demand the destruction of longstanding monuments, and I find much of its opinion compelling. 17–1717. Maybe others still who are equally affected but who come into contact with the memorial too infrequently lack standing as well. Even if the Clause expresses an individual right enforceable against the States, it is limited by its text to “law[s]” enacted by a legislature, so it is unclear whether the Bladensburg Cross would implicate any incorporated right. Excluding those symbols could make the memorial seem incomplete. The text and history of this Clause suggest that it should not be incorporated against the States. 891.Since 1925, the Bladensburg Peace Cross (Cross) has stood as a tribute to 49 area soldiers who gave their lives in the First World War.
For Immediate Release. Argued February 27, 2019—Decided June 20, 2019. For some, that monument is a symbolic resting place for ancestors who never returned home. It has thus become part of the community. Contacting Justia or any attorney through this site, via web form, email, or otherwise, does not create an attorney-client relationship.NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the preliminary print of the United States Reports. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Washington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in order that corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to press.Alito, J., announced the judgment of the Court and delivered the opinion of the Court with respect to Parts I, II–B, II–C, III, and IV, in which Roberts, C. J., and Breyer, Kagan, and Kavanaugh, JJ., joined, and an opinion with respect to Parts II–A and II–D, in which Roberts, C. J., and Breyer and Kavanaugh, JJ., joined. The Commission has used public funds to maintain the monument ever since. et al. That the cross originated as a Christian symbol and retains that meaning in many contexts does not change the fact that the symbol took on an added secular meaning when used in World War I memorials. 2 AMERICAN LEGION v. AMERICAN HUMANIST ASSN. 1. For others still, it is a historical landmark.