Conservative religious groups began a petition drive Monday to demand that Congress legislate to protect displays of the Ten Commandments in public buildings.
The group's leaders mounted the drive in response to last week's ouster of Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore for his refusal to obey a federal judge's order to remove a 2 1/2-ton monument to the Ten Commandments from the Alabama Supreme Court. An ethics panel of Alabama judges removed him from office.
"God often does his best work right after a crucifixion. What we saw with justice Roy Moore was a crucifixion. God will vindicate this man," said Vision America President Rick Scarborough at a press conference where he announced the petition drive.
Scarborough, with former Republican presidential candidates Alan Keyes and Gary Bauer, pledged to gather millions of signatures over the next year to pressure Congress to protect religious displays. The Christian Broadcasting Network and the Family Research Council are also signed on to promote the petition.
Scarborough said judicial decisions to remove the phrase "under God" from the pledge of allegiance, and to censure Moore, have built a nationwide Christian movement against liberal federal judges.
The petition contends the Ten Commandments constitute the foundation of American law, and expressions of faith are under assault by the judicial branch. It asks Congress to pass legislation to protect public displays of the Ten Commandments and to allow nondenominational prayer in public schools.
Elliot Mincberg, legal director for liberal judicial group People for the American Way, said religious displays already are protected as long as they do not promote a particular faith.
"The greatest engine of freedom of religion and of religious free expression that has ever been devised is the constitutional protection of the freedom of religion and the separation of church and state," he said.
The religious organizations plan to march on Washington in September 2004, where they said they will present their petitions to Congress.