Judges Weigh Whether Utah Crosses Are Secular

March 10, 2009

Author: P. Solomon Banda

Source: The Boston Globe

Wire Service: AP

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2009/03/10/judges_weigh_whether_utah_crosses_are_secular/

A federal appeals court is weighing Utah's use of crosses on roadside memorials honoring fallen highway patrol troopers, trying to decide if they are an endorsement of religion or a nonreligious, secular symbol of death.

A three-judge panel of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments Monday in the case involving what the group American Atheists called "heroic-size" 12-foot-high crosses placed along state highways.

Utah's 14 memorial crosses, paid for by the private Utah Highway Patrol Association, contain the highway patrol's logo and a small plaque with a photo and short biography of the fallen trooper, as well as the trooper's name, rank, badge number and year of death.

A federal judge in Utah ruled in 2007 that the crosses communicate a secular message about the deaths of the troopers and are not an illegal public endorsement of religion. That judge cited the use of religious symbols in military cemeteries.

Utah Assistant Attorney General Thom Roberts defended the use of the privately funded crosses as a way to quickly convey a message to passing motorists that a trooper died there, and said the crosses are not an endorsement of religion.

But Texas-based American Atheists argued that the crosses are symbols that convey a government endorsement of religion and shouldn't be on public land.