In last week’s 7-2 Supreme Court decision in the Bladensburg Cross case, the Court abandoned the nearly five decade old “Lemon test” in favor of a “history test.”
Under the Lemon test, from the 1971 case Lemon v. Kurtzman, a religious display, to be constitutional, 1) had to have a secular purpose; 2) its primary effect could not either advance or inhibit religion; 3) it couldn’t result in an excessive government entanglement with religion. Under the new “history test” it just has to be old.
Because the Bladensburg Cross, a monument to those who died in World War I, has been around for nearly a hundred years it’s constitutional. It doesn’t matter that it’s a Christian cross and promotes the Christian religion; the passage of time supposedly diminishes that it is a religious symbol and somehow makes it secular and constitutional.
The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), like many other groups, vehemently denounced this ruling.
Slavery was around for far longer than the Bladensburg Cross; women couldn’t vote for a very long time. Therefore, if this “history test” were applied to those things they would be perfectly constitutional, right?
But we at MRFF are wondering how this new “history test” doctrine will play out in a current federal lawsuit filed on behalf of a MRFF client — a case in which MRFF clearly has history on its side.
Here’s the background of the case:
On January 28, 2019, MRFF founder and president Mikey Weinstein contacted the VA Medical Facility in Manchester, New Hampshire on behalf of fourteen clients, all of whom are veterans who receive medical care at the facility and most of whom are Christians, regarding the placement of a Bible on the POW/MIA Missing Man Table located in the facility’s entry area.
Within three hours of being contacted by Mikey, the Acting Staff Assistant to the Director of the Manchester VAMC emailed a confirmation that the Bible would be immediately removed from the display, writing:
"I want you to know that you can inform your clients that the Manchester VAMC has the utmost respect and admiration for all Veterans, regardless of their beliefs. As such we are going to be removing the Bible from the display to better serve all Veterans."
But in February the Bible was put back on the table, now in a large, bolted-down plexiglass display case, making it not just part of the display but the focal point of the display.
So, in May, one of MRFF’s clients, Air Force veteran James Chamberlain, filed a federal lawsuit to get the Bible removed from the display.
What does the Bladensburg Cross decision’s “history test” have to do with this case? Well, history is clearly on the side of MRFF and its client when it comes to keeping Bibles off of POW/MIA table displays.
A Bible was not part of the original POW/MIA table tradition, started in 1967 by a group of Vietnam combat pilots known as the “River Rats.” The untraditional practice of adding a Bible, and turning what was started as a tradition to honor all POW’s and MIAs into a display honoring only Christians, didn’t emerge until over thirty years later, when the VFW Ladies Auxiliary published a script for the setting of the table and included a Bible among the items in a 1999 issue of their magazine.
With over three decades of history in which the Bible was not part of these displays, keeping Bibles out of them should be the decision that the court comes to if a “history test” is applied. Or will this new “history test” only work in favor of inching us closer to being a real life Gilead, blessed be.