Texas State Capitol's Ten Commandments Monument - Austin, TX
Posted by: 
Raven
N 30° 16.519 W 097° 44.448
14R E 621115 N 3349964
The Ten Commandments monument on the Texas State Capitol grounds was the topic of a sharply divided U.S. Supreme Court case on June 27, 2005. It addressed the constitutionality of placing such a monument on government land.
Waymark Code: WMMHA9
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 09/21/2014
Views: 6
The Ten Commandments monument is located on the Texas State Capitol northern grounds, behind the capitol building (between the Texas Capitol and Supreme Court buildings). It is a 6-foot high by 3-foot wide Texas "Sunset Red" granite structure in the traditional shape of the biblical stones and inscribed with the Ten Commandments.
Erected in 1961 by the Fraternal Order of Eagles of Texas (a state civic organization) with the support of Cecil B. DeMille (director of the film "The Ten Commandments"), the monument was a present to the people of Texas: the donating organization paid for its erection while the State accepted it and selected its site based on the recommendation of the state agency responsible for maintaining the Capitol grounds -- thereby acknowledging it as a historical display on the 22-acre State Capitol grounds.
The monument started becoming the topic of a heated judicial debate starting in 2003, when a suit brought by Thomas Van Orden of Austin, TX challenged that acceptance and placement of that monument by the State of Texas violated the US Constitution's First Amendment, which states that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof (among other government restrictions). In essence, the suit contended that the monument's etched wording was unconstitutional as it violated the doctrine of separation of church and state.
The suit ultimately made it to the U.S. Supreme Court. On Monday June 27, 2005, a sharply divided Supreme Court ruled, by a vote of 5 to 4, that the display was constitutional. Chief Justice William Rehnquist delivered the plurality opinion of the Court; Justice Stephen Breyer concurred in the judgment but wrote separately. It upheld the constitutionality of displaying the Ten Commandments on government land (in other words, the Texas State Capitol's grounds) on the grounds -- pardon the pun -- that the monument conveyed both a religious and secular message.
Interestingly enough, the US Supreme Court also ruled on another case involving two similar instances in Kentucky courthouses that very same day. Again by a 5-to-4 vote, the Supreme Court declared those Ten Commandments to be unconstitutional. The "swing vote" in both cases was Justice Stephen Breyer.
The news of that Supreme Court decision was published internationally, as can be attested by the following news articles:
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