Friedman v. Board of County Com'rs of Bernalillo County

• Decision Date: 26 December 1985
• Docket Number: No. 82-1064,82-1064
• Citation: 781 F.2d 777
• Parties: Al FRIEDMAN, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS OF BERNALILLO COUNTY, David Santillanes, Chairman; Juven Sanchez, Robert Hawk, Wray Simmons, E.R. (Corky) Morris, Members, Defendants-Appellees, American Jewish Congress and the Rutherford Institute, Amici Curiae.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit

Page 777

781 F.2d 777

54 USLW 2364

Al FRIEDMAN, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS OF BERNALILLO COUNTY, David

Santillanes, Chairman; Juven Sanchez, Robert

Hawk, Wray Simmons, E.R. (Corky) Morris,

Members, Defendants-Appellees,

American Jewish Congress and the Rutherford Institute, Amici Curiae.

No. 82-1064.

United States Court of Appeals, Tenth Circuit.

Dec. 26, 1985.

Paul A. Phillips, Cooperating Atty., A.C.L.U. of New Mexico, Albuquerque, N.M., for plaintiff-appellant.

Casey Shpall, Mountain States Legal Foundation, Denver, Colo., Roger J. Marzulla, Maxwell A. Miller, and Michael R. Perna also of Mountain States Legal Foundation, Denver, Colo., and Hunter L. Geer, Albuquerque, N.M., on the briefs for defendants-appellees.

Ronald A. Krauss, Lois C. Waldman, and Marc D. Stern, American Jewish Congress, New York City, and Michael G. Sutin, Albuquerque, N.M., filed a brief for amicus curiae American Jewish Congress, et al.

John W. Whitehead and D. Kevin Ikenberry, of the Rutherford Institute, Manassas, Va., filed an amicus curiae brief.

Before HOLLOWAY, Chief Judge, McWILLIAMS, BARRETT, McKAY, LOGAN, SEYMOUR, and MOORE, Circuit Judges.

LOGAN, Circuit Judge.

This case challenges a county government's use of a seal bearing, among other things, a latin cross and the Spanish motto, "CON ESTA VENCEMOS," under the Establishment and Free Exercise Clauses of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution and under the New Mexico Constitution. The district court found no constitutional violations, Johnson v. Board of County Commissioners, 528 F.Supp. 919, 925 (D.N.M.1981), and a divided panel of this court affirmed. On rehearing en banc, we now vacate our earlier opinions and reverse on Establishment Clause grounds.

I

The circular seal that plaintiff challenges in this action under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 contains the phrases, "Bernalillo County," and "State of New Mexico," separated by two diamonds along its outermost green edge. Within an inner circle, the Spanish motto, "CON ESTA VENCEMOS," which translates into English as, "With This We Conquer," or "With This We Overcome," arches over a golden latin cross, ¹ highlighted by white edging and a blaze of golden light. The motto and cross are set in a blue background depicting the sky over four darker blue mountains and a green plain. Eight white sheep stand on the plain. Copies of the seal follow as an appendix to this opinion.

There is no record of when the county originally adopted the seal or of its purpose in doing so. The seal was used, however, on some county documents as early as 1925, and again from at least 1945 to 1956. Since 1973, the seal has been displayed on county documents, stationery, motor vehicles, and the shoulder patches of sheriff's department officers. According to testimony, officials expanded use of the seal merely to identify the county as a governmental unit distinct from Albuquerque.

Yet at least one county commissioner testified that at the time use of the seal was expanded he knew the cross represented the role of the Catholic Church in the settlement of the Southwest. Specifically he thought that the cross referred to priests and friars who accompanied Spanish conquistadors into the area. Two historians and an expert in heraldry testified that the cross on the seal represented Catholicism, Christianity, and the Spaniards. One of the historical experts also admitted that religious conversion of the Native American population in New Mexico sometimes was accomplished through force; the other verified use of Spanish Inquisition tactics in New Mexico.

The evidence is not completely clear on the meaning of "ESTA" or "this" in the motto, but plaintiff's expert on the Spanish language testified that the only thing "ESTA" referred to very clearly was the cross. Even one of defendants' expert historians testified that, if the cross were eliminated, his interpretation of the seal's meaning, i.e., "We are overcoming with our Christian heritage," would be less than obvious. But he thought "ESTA" literally referred to the entire seal. Lay witnesses for the plaintiff and the defendants understood the "this" of the motto to be the cross.

The interpretation to be given the appearance of the sheep on the seal also was the subject of some dispute, generally divided along a layperson-expert line. Plaintiff testified that the sheep apparently represented the "flock of Jesus." The defendants' experts, on the other hand, saw the sheep as symbolic of the importance of the sheep-raising industry in Bernalillo County history, and not of the Christian "lamb of God" or "good shepherd" or "flock of Jesus."

The district court found no violation of the three-part Establishment Clause test of Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602, 612-13, 91 S.Ct. 2105, 2111, 29 L.Ed.2d 745 (1971), having been persuaded by the testimony of the defendants' experts that the significance of the sheep and cross was solely historical. ² Johnson, 528 F.Supp. at 923-

                25.  The court also characterized the amount of money the county must spend for display of the motto and cross as minimal, and dismissed the Free Exercise claim.    Id. at 925.  Although the district court recited the claim under Article II, Section 11 of the New Mexico Constitution and said it was properly joined under United Mine Workers v. Gibbs, 383 U.S. 715, 86 S.Ct. 1130, 16 L.Ed.2d 218 (1966), it did not discuss explicit reasons for rejecting it.  Id. at 920.  Because we find the Establishment Clause issue dispositive, we do not address the Free Exercise Clause and New Mexico constitutional claims
                

II

The district court correctly began its analysis with recitation of the three independent tests of Lemon, 403 U.S. at 612-13, 91 S.Ct. at 2111. Although the Supreme Court has been unwilling to endorse Lemon as the "be-all" and "end-all" in Establishment Clause cases, it has continued to apply it almost exclusively. See Wallace v. Jaffree, --- U.S. ----, ----, 105 S.Ct. 2479, 2489, 86 L.Ed.2d 29 (U.S. June 4, 1985); Lynch v. Donnelly, 465 U.S. 668, 678, 104 S.Ct. 1355, 1361, 79 L.Ed.2d 604 (1984); cf. Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U.S. 783, 103 S.Ct. 3330, 77 L.Ed.2d 1019 (1983) (Lemon test not used in Establishment Clause challenge to state legislature's use of chaplain; use upheld); Larson v. Valente, 456 U.S. 228, 102 S.Ct. 1673, 72 L.Ed.2d 33 (1982) (Lemon test not used in Establishment Clause challenge to charitable solicitation law; law invalidated). See generally Smith, Some Observations on the Establishment Clause, Pepperdine L.Rev. 457, 469 (1984); Van Alstyne, Trends in the Supreme Court: Mr. Jefferson's Crumbling Wall--A Comment on Lynch v. Donnelly, 1984 Duke L.J. 770, 782 (1984).

Under Lemon the Establishment Clause is violated if any of the three following conditions are not met. First, the governmental action in question must have a secular purpose. Second, its principal or primary effect must be one that "neither advances nor inhibits" religion. And, third, the action must not foster an excessive government entanglement with religion. Lemon, 403 U.S. at 612-13, 91 S.Ct. at 2111. The goal is the prevention of "unnecessary intrusion of either the church or the state upon the other." Lynch, 465 U.S. at 672, 104 S.Ct. at 1358. Each prong of the Lemon test is independent. The challenged government action must survive all three to be allowed under the Establishment Clause. See id. --- U.S. at ----, 105 S.Ct. at 2489; Stone v. Graham, 449 U.S. 39, 40, 101 S.Ct. 192, 193, 66 L.Ed.2d 199 (1980); Bell v. Little Axe Independent School District, 766 F.2d 1391, 1402 (10th Cir.1985).

III

Our review of the record convinces us that the district court's finding in favor of the county on the second prong of Lemon--the "effect" test--was clearly erroneous. ³ "The Establishment Clause prohibits In addition, the resulting advancement need not be material or tangible. An implicit symbolic benefit is enough. See Larkin v. Grendel's Den, 459 U.S. 116, 125, 103 S.Ct. 505, 511, 74 L.Ed.2d 297 (1982). In Larkin the Supreme Court struck down a Massachusetts statute granting churches and schools the de facto power to veto liquor license applications for businesses within a certain distance of the institutions. The Court stated:

                the government from making adherence to a religion relevant in any way to a person's standing in the political community."    Lynch, 465 U.S. at 687, 104 S.Ct. at 1366 (O'Connor, J., concurring).  "The effect prong asks whether, irrespective of government's actual purpose, the practice ... conveys a message of endorsement or disapproval.  An affirmative answer ... should render the challenged practice invalid."    Id. at 690, 104 S.Ct. at 1368.  In other words, the existence of a non-secular effect is to be judged by an objective standard, which looks only to the reaction of the average receiver of the government communication or average observer of the government action.  This contrasts with the subjective examination under the purpose test.  If the challenged practice is likely to be interpreted as advancing religion, it has an impermissible effect and violates the Constitution, regardless of whether it actually is intended to do so
                

"[T]he mere appearance of a joint exercise of legislative authority by Church and State provides a significant symbolic benefit to religion in the minds of some by reason of the power conferred. It does not strain our prior holdings to say that the statute can be seen as having a 'primary' and 'principal' effect of advancing religion."

Id. at 125-26, 103 S.Ct. at 511 (emphasis added). Similarly we have held that even the unspoken grant of a state "imprimatur" to religious activity in primary schools is impermissible under the effect test. See Little Axe, 766 F.2d at 1405. "The Government may depict objects with spiritual content, but it may not promote or give its stamp of approval to such spiritual content." Allen v. Hickel, 424 F.2d 944, 948 (D.C....