ACLU: Still Taking The Fun Out Of Christmas
Or, is that taking the Christ out of Christmas?
Threat of ACLU lawsuit means no cross in Pontchatula
The huge cross near Ponchatoula’s downtown locomotive won’t be covered with blazing white bulbs for this year’s Christmas Lights Festival.
Instead, a second bar has been added to display banners advertising citywide events.
The cross was highly noticeable last year. But the American Civil Liberties Union said it would sue if the cross was lit up again for this year’s Christmas Festival.
Mayor Bob Zabbia said city officials don’t agree with the ACLU but realized that they probably would not win, and lawsuits are costly.
And, said Zabbia, “The law is the law. It doesn’t make sense to fight something you’re not going to win.”
Thanks, ACLU! Doing away with the reason for the season one threat of lawsuit at a time.
Update by Jay: Someone in the comments point to an excellent Federalist Blog post ripping the ACLU on this kind of stuff!
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Posted by William Teach on November 30, 2008 5:43 pm
» Filed Under 1st Amendment, ACLU, Anti-Americanism, Bigotry, Bill Of Rights, Christmas, Church And State, Multiculturalism/PC, News, Political Correctness, Secular Humanism, Social Engineering, Socialism, U.S. Constitution, liberalism
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12 Responses to “ACLU: Still Taking The Fun Out Of Christmas”
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Paul Madison rips the ACLU a new one:
http://federalistblog.us/2007/02/supreme_ignorance_aclus_empty_establishment_claims.html
There’s a special layer of Hell reserved for lawyers of the ACLU. I only wish Dante were still around to describe it.
The ACLU makes me sick. I for one will be sending them a dozen Christmas cards. I might even put a cross in my yard, right next to the nativity scene!
You put all the crosses on your lawn you want, just don’t make me pay for it!
I can’t believe the hypocrisy of SoCons. They marginalize us who actually advocate limited government – that the government should consist of the cops, the courts and the military and nothing else. They certainly should not be endorsing anyone’s religion, or paying for christmas light (much as I like them) for that matter.
The SoCons are worse than the left. At least the left is honest about it’s goal to do away with our freedoms.
No one is making you pay for it, Jason. You do not live there. What if the people of the town do? The Constitution says nothing, NOTHING, about this. It simply says “Congress shall pass no law.”
You completely missed the point. The point is the city is using a gun to steal one person’s money to pay for a cross or secular decoration against his will. This is morally wrong, whether it happens to me or anyone else. There is no such thing as “the people of the town” apart from the individuals that make it up. When one says “the people of the town”, what they really mean is that the majority chooses to violate the rights of the minority. This is how liberals think. This is simply not an issue left up to the government or the majority. If you want to get together and fund it on voluntary basis, that’s fine. I might even contribute to it. But don’t use tax money to do it.
Notice this goes beyond the issue of establishment of religion. It is also an issue of property rights. The religious issue is made crystal clear in the the 1st Amendment. I have no idea how SoCons can miss that. The right to be secure in one’s property is covered in the 5th Amendment regardless of how the courts have ruled. I’d be amused to see you try to argue that the founders would have been okay with tax funded decorations, religious or otherwise.
Let’s say for the sake of argument that it is merely an issue of establishment of religion. Tell me how you’d feel if tax money was used to put up a mosque or crescent or whatever a Muslim would see fit to put up. How would you feel? Yeah, I know the ACLU wouldn’t do anything about it, but I think we’d both want them to. If you can understand this, you will understand why secular folks from the right and wrong side of the aisle get so pissed off.
Let me reiterate the point that you failed to address. I want to keep government small. It should protect individual rights. This means, courts, cops, and military. That’s it. Nothing more. No christmas lights. You may not use tax money to advance your social agenda whether it’s the religion of the right or the the welfare state of the left (as though there’s much difference.) The reason why the republicans have elected socialists like W and put forth even more socialist candidates such as McCain is the failure to see this point.
Hoskin, we should celebrate our judeo-christian heritage. If that means putting up Christmas decorations on town halls and capital buildings across the nation, then what is the big deal? If it is such a big deal, lets take Christmas off the national holiday list and put everyone to work that day. Lets see how you like it then.
I’m all for celebrating it, but just not at tax payer expense. The “big deal” is that we cannot effectively defend small government by cheating on that principle when we really just can’t resist in this one little exception. Wondering “what’s the big deal” is how children argue when they are stopped from misbehaving. Can anyone addresses why my points might be mistaken? I’m interested in arguments.
The religious right arrogantly claims that they are the intellectual aires of the founders. They most certainly are not. The republicans have done nothing but retreated from the left’s expansion of social programs of government since the New Deal. This is inconsistency is one explanation of this.
Just because there are alot of Jews and Christians in this country does not mean it is a Judeo-Christian nation. There is a precious little evidence of this heritage in any of the founding documents apart from a vague reference to “a creator (which is not inconsistent with secular proponents of natural law.) Most of the founders were deists or agnostics. For example, Thomas Jefferson in a letter to his nephew said “Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God ..”
The treaty of Tripoli, signed by George Washington among others stated that “The government of the United States is not in any sense founded upon the Christian Religion.”
Of course, there is much, much more:
http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/buckner_ncn.html
Jason, there are lots and lots of things that are done at taxpayer expense that people do not agree with. For instance, federal money going to ACORN and Planned Parenthood. Lots of liberals are upset about money going to the Dept of Defense, CIA, and intelligence agencies. Liberals want federal money to go to pay for abortions and embryonic stem cell research. Conservatives are dismayed that tax money goes to pay for welfare deadbeats, the UN (I guess they would be a welfare deadbeat, too), and far left groups.
I have read your points, and, I am not quite sure where you are going with them. First of all, the 1st Amendment doesn’t say what you think it says, to wit, it says congress shall pass no law denying practice of religion nor establishing one as a national religion. This applies solely to the federal congress. Many state constitutions mirror the federal one, but, in this case, we are talking about a town that has done this for a very long time as a tradition. No one has complained except the ACLU. Why should the ACLU be able to dictate their beliefs over the wishes of the people who live in that town? If they wanted to put up a Koran display, hey, let them. That is their choice. And, while I might not like it, I wouldn’t complain to the ACLU, because it is THEIR choice. And there is nothing unconstitutional about it.
And I would highly suggest you read the 5th Amendment, because it doesn’t say what you think it does.
As far as being a Judeo-Christian nation, we aren’t: we are a nation founded on Christian principles, and based in law.
I realize that there are many things the government pays for that it shouldn’t. Rather than lay down and accept it as fact of nature, I am going to do everything I can to oppose it. All the things you mentioned were not at one time left up to individuals themselves. Government intervention into the economy is something man made, and so can be reversed.
BTW though I am pro-choice, I don’t want tax funded abortions or stem cell research. I realize I must not violate my principles, even though I think stem cell research has enormous potential for humanity.
What makes this difficult to do is people who allegedly share my principles of small government, renege on this principles whenever their pet belief, such as state sponsored religion, are at stake. In order to have principles which mean anything, we must be consistent.
Once you concede to state funding of religion, or anything else, how can you oppose the next liberal social program without being a hypocrite?
I am not a constitutional scholar. But again, I’m sure the founders would not approve of all these government programs. I would like to see it clearly stated in the constitution that “congress shall make no laws abridging the right to property.” If the fifth amendment is not clear on it, let’s work within the system to amend the constitution to make this clear. We can also work to repeal the 16th amendment. The founders wanted separation of government and religion. A mixture of religion and government is always bad. If the 14th amendment doesn’t extend this protection to state and local governments, let’s amend the constitution.
As for a Koran being displayed, I’m fine with it to (from a legal not moral standpoint). But the very important point is this. They must never be allowed to do this with government money. If not, where do you really think it will end at just a Koran?
I don’t think the founders would agree with you. See the link I posted above. Which exclusive Christian principles did you have in mind?