Mt. Soledad Cross Case Reaches California Court of Appeal

From the Thomas More Law Center:

RANCHO SANTA FE, CA – A sixteen-year legal battle over the presence of a concrete cross surrounded by a veterans war memorial atop Mt. Soledad in La Jolla, California is moving on to the California Court of Appeal.

San Diegans for the Mt. Soledad National War Memorial, a community group which garnered 76 per cent of the vote in their successful ballot proposition requiring the City of San Diego to donate the property under the cross to the federal government, has appealed the Superior Court order that found the ballot measure unconstitutional and unenforceable.

Rancho Santa Fe attorney Charles LiMandri, Director of the west coast office of the Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm, is representing the community group, its chairman, members of the Memorial Association, and the sons of the late contractor who built the cross in 1954. All have joined together to preserve the memorial and cross.

The cross has been the subject of a 1989 federal lawsuit filed by atheist Philip Paulson. In 1991, Federal District Court Judge Gordon Thompson ruled that the stand-alone cross on City-owned property violated the California Constitution.

However, since 2000 the cross has become the centerpiece of the Mt. Soledad Veterans Memorial.

In December 2004, the United States Congress designated the Memorial a national veterans memorial and authorized the Department of the Interior to accept a donation of the property. Supporters of the Memorial believed that a transfer of the property to the federal government was the best hope for maintaining the cross as its centerpiece in the face of continued legal challenges by Paulson.

Despite widespread popular support for the cross to remain, as it is where it is, the San Diego City Council declined to make the donation. A grass roots movement to overturn the City Council action was spearheaded by a religiously diverse group of local citizens, “San Diegans the Mt. Soledad National War Memorial.” More than 100,000 County residents signed the group’s petition calling on the Council to reverse its position.

As a result, the Council Proposition A, which authorized the donation, was placed on the July 2005 special election ballot. Prop A passed with more than 76% of the vote.

Before the vote on Prop A, attorneys for Paulson filed a lawsuit in state court seeking to stop the election. Initially, San Diego Superior Court Judge Patricia Yim Cowett allowed the vote to take place (although she ordered that Prop A had to receive a supermajority of 66% of the vote in order to pass).

However, after the election, Judge Cowett ruled that Prop A was unconstitutional under California Constitution which prohibits aid to religious purposes, and discrimination against or preference for religion.

Astoundingly, Judge Cowett also found representation of the City by an attorney associated with the Thomas More Law Center, a Christian public interest law firm, was an unconstitutional “entanglement” of the City government with religion.

Charles LiMandri, director of the Thomas More Law Center’s west coast regional office, said, “As far as we know, this is the first court in the nation to hold that it is unconstitutional for Christian lawyers to represent government entities. That really underscores this judge’s anti-Christian bias.”

LiMandri filed a motion to vacate Judge Cowett’s ruling on behalf of his clients. Judge Cowett refused to even consider their motion. Filing the motion, however, gave them standing to appeal.

Newly elected San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders has announced publicly that the City will also appeal Judge Cowett’s order and commended LiMandri for his pro bono work on behalf of the City in the state court case.