COURTS: A civil liberties group prepares to sue Duluth to have a Ten Commandments monument removed from outside City Hall.
BY BAIRD HELGESON
NEWS TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
Get ready for a battle over the Ten Commandments monument outside Duluth City Hall.
The Minnesota Civil Liberties Union will file a complaint as soon as Friday demanding the city remove the monument.
"It's offensive and intimidating to people who aren't Christian," said Chuck Samuelson, executive director of the Minnesota Civil Liberties Union in St. Paul. "The United States of America is not an exclusive club. This is a civil rights issue, and it needs to be cleared up."
Duluth is violating the U.S. Constitution's requirement for separation of church and state, the group says. According to the Bible, the Ten Commandments were written by God and handed down to Moses atop Mount Sinai.
The complaint, expected to have 36 plaintiffs, will give the city about 30 days to agree to remove the monument. The group will sue the city in federal court if officials don't act by then.
It would be the first court challenge of Duluth's monument.
Samuelson wouldn't identify the plaintiffs until the complaint is filed. This summer, the group sent letters to its Duluth members seeking plaintiffs.
Duluth's seven-foot granite monument has been on the City Hall lawn, facing the intersection of Fourth Avenue West and First Street, since 1957. It was a gift to the city from the Fraternal Order of Eagles Aerie No. 79, which closed in 1979.
Supporters argue they have a First Amendment right to keep the monument where it is, and that the commandments are the foundation of U.S. law.
Those who want the monument removed say Christians can pray, worship and sing hymns all they want. They just can't plant a monument to their particular religion in front of a government building. They say it turns City Hall into a religious shrine.
City Attorney Bryan Brown has asked to meet with Mayor Herb Bergson and City Council President Jim Stauber to discuss the potential lawsuit. No date for the meeting has been set.
"We should do what we can to make sure the Ten Commandments monument remains at the location where it is at," Stauber said Wednesday.
Councilor Greg Gilbert, an attorney, said the issue already is being debated in higher federal courts.
"All parties should just sit tight," Gilbert said. "Let's wait and let the issue be resolved at a higher level, and then the city and other municipalities can comply with that."
Brown wrote a Feb. 9 memo to Bergson and Stauber saying the city would have to pay the group's legal bills and any penalty imposed by a judge if the city loses a lawsuit.
Stauber said he suspects residents and groups that want the Ten Commandments to remain in front of City Hall would help pay for a legal fight.
Brown would not speculate publicly about the city's chances of winning a lawsuit.
The Minnesota Civil Liberties Union is trying to get similar monuments removed in Albert Lea, Winona and Moorhead.
The American Civil Liberties Union successfully forced the removal of several religious monuments from public buildings around the nation.
The U.S. Supreme Court has stated that for a government act to be constitutional, it must not have a religious purpose and not advance one particular religion.
Monuments are being challenged in Texas and La Crosse, Wis. Last summer in Montgomery, Ala., a federal court ordered workers to remove a Ten Commandments stone from the rotunda of the state judicial building.
The ACLU was willing to compromise in Montana.
In 2000, ACLU officials said they would allow county officials in Miles, Mont., to continue displaying the Ten Commandments monument if officials moved it to a less prominent area and added four other monuments of historic documents that influenced modern law.
But that was deemed too expensive by county officials, and the monument was later removed.
Samuelson doesn't see room for compromise in Duluth.
"Shame on the Minnesota Civil Liberties Union for not getting this resolved in Duluth in 1957," he said.
No-one is immune from the stupidity that IS the ACLU....
