June 11, 2009
Source: Tulsa World
http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=14&articleid=20090608_298_0_DENVER847240
An appeals court ruled Monday that a Ten Commandments monument at the county courthouse in Stigler violates the Constitution because its primary effect is to endorse a religion.
The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 3-0 in a challenge to the monument brought by the American Civil Liberties Union of Oklahoma and by a county resident.
"We hold that the [Haskell County commissioners'] actions in authorizing and maintaining the monument . . . had the impermissible principal or primary effect of endorsing religion in violation of the Establishment Clause" of the Constitution, the judges wrote in a 52-page decision.