OLYMPIA, Wash. — Attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund filed suit in federal court requesting a temporary restraining order to allow a citizen to display a nativity scene in the rotunda at the state capitol building. State officials had denied the citizen’s requests, despite allowing another citizen, a rabbi, to erect a menorah in the rotunda. The state also erected a “holiday tree” that was donated by a third private citizen.
“It’s ridiculous that Americans have to think twice about whether it’s acceptable to celebrate Christmas in public,” said ADF Senior Legal Counsel Byron Babione. “It was entirely appropriate for the state to recognize Hanukkah by allowing a menorah display at the capitol building. But it was entirely unconstitutional to deny the display of a nativity scene to recognize Christmas.”
The temporary restraining order, if granted, would allow the nativity scene to be displayed on the same terms as the menorah throughout the rest of the holiday season.
“The irony is that with all the talk about ‘tolerance,’ the state has chosen to be intolerant of the 95 percent of Americans who celebrate Christmas,” said Babione. “It’s a sad day in America when you have to retain an attorney simply to put up a nativity scene at Christmastime.”
A copy of the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington at Tacoma in the case
Wesselius v. DeShaw can be read at
www.telladf.org/UserDocs/WesseliusComplaint.pdf.
ADF is a legal alliance defending the right to hear and speak the Truth through strategy, training, funding, and litigation.
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