The Supreme Court's pair of 5-to-4 rulings Monday amounted to a split verdict on the permissibility of Ten Commandments displays, striking down framed copies in two Kentucky courthouses but upholding a 6-foot granite monument on a 22-acre lot surrounding the Texas Capitol.
''The lesson to people wanting to promote religious symbols is to conceal what their purpose is," said Douglas Laycock, a church-state specialist at the University of Texas law school. ''For the other side . . . it limits how aggressively a state can endorse Christianity."
Justices said Ten Commandments exhibits would be upheld if their main purpose was to honor the nation's legal, rather than religious, traditions, and if they didn't promote one religious sect over another. How long an exhibit has stood -- as well as its location -- also will determine its constitutionality, and locations open to everyone are more acceptable settings than schoolhouses filled with young students, the court held.
''It is very encouraging that the Supreme Court understands the historical and legal significance of displaying the Ten Commandments," said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel of the American Center for Law and Justice, which supports greater public acknowledgment of religion.
Several religious activists are taking steps to move ahead on the issue, despite the confusion on the constitutional issues.
The Rev. Patrick Mahoney, director of the Christian Defense Coalition in Washington, announced plans to try to place displays similar to the monument at the Texas Capitol in 100 cities and towns across the country within the next year. He made the announcement Monday in Boise, Idaho, where an interfaith community network's efforts to get a monument returned to public property have been boosted by the ruling.
Mahoney hopes to work with Christian lawyers to draft a resolution that can be used nationwide by local residents to request the return or the placement of monuments on public land.
''The public display of Ten Commandments unites communities," he said.
