Writing here, I suggested that rather than splitting fine factual hairs about when and under what conditions the Ten Commandments are allowed in public places and when they’re not, the Supremes would have done better to do what all good legislators do (for their decisions in this area are much more legislative than judicial) and just splitting the difference, allowing the posting of 5 instead of 10.
Now Mark Steyn has come up with a modification of my plan. (O.K., he didn’t know it was my plan, but I won’t hold that against him.) Noting that Justice Breyer had approved the Texas display because the items on display there
had been there 40 years and were thus part of “a broader moral and historical message reflective of a cultural heritage,” whereas the Kentucky display was newer and “a more contemporary state effort to focus attention upon a religious text is certainly likely to prove divisive,”
Steyn proposes “a sliding scale”:
If you put up the Commandments before 1965, you can have all Ten; between 1966 and 1979, you can have six firm Commandments plus a couple of strong recommendations; from 1980 to 1991, it’s two Commandments and a half-dozen lifestyle tips?
Steyn better be careful. Justice Breyer may find his remarks “divisive,” and if he does no mere “parchment barrier” of the First Amendment is likely to provide much protection.
“Steyn proposes “a sliding scale”:”
A better proposal is to just post the ones that are still illegal. That way we get ot hear the right harping about how they really really miss the fact that you can’t have a law declaring “thou shal have no other gods before me.”