City of Elkhart v. Books
The Supreme Court declined to hear a dispute over a decades-old Ten Commandments monument outside Elkhart, Indiana's city hall, leaving in place a lower court ruling that the display was unconstitutional.
Justice Stevens wrote separately to defend the denial, arguing the monument's oversized religious text undercut claims it was purely historical, while Chief Justice Rehnquist, joined by Justices Scalia and Thomas, dissented and would have taken the case to decide whether the long-standing monument could stay.
How it got here: A federal trial court granted summary judgment for the city; a divided Seventh Circuit panel reversed, and the city asked the Supreme Court to review that ruling, which it declined to do.
The Case in Depth
What happened
Since 1958, a 6-foot granite monument inscribed with the Ten Commandments and other symbols had stood outside Elkhart, Indiana's Municipal Building, financed by a fraternal service organization. In 1998, county residents sued the city, arguing the monument's presence on public property violated the Establishment Clause's ban on government endorsement of religion.
The question before the Court
Could the city of Elkhart, Indiana keep a 40-year-old Ten Commandments monument outside its municipal building without the Supreme Court stepping in to review whether it violated the separation of church and state?
Why it matters
The decision leaves cities uncertain about how far they can go in displaying religious symbols alongside historical markers on public property. Because the Court did not rule on the merits, similar Ten Commandments and religious-monument disputes in other cities remained unresolved and continued to be litigated case by case in the years that followed.
What changes now
Because the Supreme Court denied certiorari, the Seventh Circuit's ruling that the monument's display violated the Establishment Clause remains in effect, and no further Supreme Court proceedings in this case will occur. The denial itself sets no binding nationwide rule, but Chief Justice Rehnquist's dissent signaled continued disagreement among the justices over how the Establishment Clause applies to long-standing religious monuments on government property.
What this does not decide
The denial of certiorari does not decide whether the monument's display was constitutional. It leaves the Seventh Circuit's ruling against the city in place without the Supreme Court weighing in on the merits, and it sets no nationwide rule for similar monuments elsewhere.
Concurrences and dissents
Concurrence — Justice Stevens
“The graphic emphasis placed on those first lines is rather hard to square with the proposition that the monument expresses no particular religious preference”Stevens argues the monument's oversized religious text undercuts claims it is purely secular.
Justice Stevens defended the denial of certiorari, arguing dissents from cert denials are generally unnecessary and can mislead by presenting one-sided facts. He pointed out that the dissent ignored the monument's oversized opening text declaring 'I AM the LORD thy God' and downplayed its religious symbols, and that the dedication ceremony emphasized religious redemption rather than history. He found the Seventh Circuit's reasoning sufficient and saw no need for further review.
Dissent — Justice Rehnquist
Chief Justice Rehnquist, joined by Justices Scalia and Thomas, argued the Court should have granted certiorari. He contended the monument had significant secular and historical value, that Stone v. Graham did not control outside the compulsory-schooling context, and that the city's stated secular purpose deserved deference. He would have upheld the monument as reflecting the Ten Commandments' role in Western legal history rather than an unconstitutional religious endorsement.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The case reached the Court after the Seventh Circuit applied the Lemon test, a three-part framework for Establishment Clause cases asking whether a government action has a secular purpose, avoids advancing or inhibiting religion as its primary effect, and avoids excessive government entanglement with religion.
- The appeals court found the monument's display lacked a secular purpose, relying in part on the Supreme Court's earlier decision in Stone v. Graham, which struck down mandatory classroom postings of the Commandments for lacking a secular purpose.
- The appeals court also concluded that, regardless of purpose, the monument's display had the primary effect of advancing religion, pointing to the oversized lettering of 'The Ten Commandments — I AM the LORD thy God' and religious symbols including Stars of David and a Chi-Rho emblem representing Christ.
- Because the Supreme Court denied review, it did not decide whether the appeals court's application of the Lemon test was correct; the denial simply left the Seventh Circuit's ruling against the city in place without a Supreme Court holding on the merits.