In an op-ed for the USAToday, Notre Dame law professor Richard Garnett argues that the Supreme Court should use the upcoming Mojave Cross case as an opportunity to set the record straight on governmental religious displays. More specifically, he wants the court to separate what he seems to consider petty concerns from more severe intrusions into the religious sphere. I have great respect for Professor Garnett, but I have some problems with this.
The separation of church and state, correctly understood, is a powerful, crucial protection for genuine diversity and liberty of religious conscience. Its proper goal is not to put religion in its place but to keep the state in its place. It is not, however, meaningfully threatened by a Ten Commandments monument in a town park or a land swap involving a cross in the desert. The court should..leave the monitoring of monuments to the good sense of citizens and to the give-and-take of ordinary politics.
More thoughts on this later. What are yours? Is he right?
