Opinion ID: 173618
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Whether the Free Speech Clause Protects these Cross Memorials from Establishment Clause Scrutiny

Text: As an initial matter, UHPA argues that the displays at issue in this case are UHPA's private speech, not the expression of the state of Utah and, therefore, that the Free Speech Clause, not the Establishment Clause, should govern our analysis in this case. Further, UHPA asserts that Utah would violate the Free Speech Clause by prohibiting the displays at issue in this case and, therefore, that the Establishment Clause cannot mandate the prohibition of these displays. The UHPA is supported in this position by amici curiae, the States of Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, and Oklahoma, and The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. These arguments fail in light of the Supreme Court's recent decision in Pleasant Grove City v. Summum, ___ U.S. ___, 129 S.Ct. 1125, 172 L.Ed.2d 853 (2009). In Pleasant Grove City, the Supreme Court held that [j]ust as government-commissioned and government-financed monuments speak for the government, so do privately financed and donated monuments that the government accepts and displays to the public on government land. Id. at 1133. Thus, the Court concluded, as a general matter, [the Free Speech Clause's] forum analysis simply does not apply to the installation of permanent monuments on public property. Id. at 1138. As permanent monuments erected on public land, [7] the cross memorials at issue in this case fall squarely within the rule pronounced by the Court in Pleasant Grove City and, therefore, must be analyzed not as private speech, but as government speechthe scope and content of which is restrained, inter alia, by the Establishment Clause. See id. at 1131-32; see also Green, 568 F.3d at 797 n. 8. Both at oral argument and in a letter submitted pursuant to Fed. R.App. P. 28(j), the state amici and the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty attempt to distinguish this case from Pleasant Grove City, arguing that even in light of the Court's opinion in Pleasant Grove City, the displays at issue in this case should be treated as private speech. They argue that Pleasant Grove City can be distinguished from our case in three ways: (1) in Pleasant Grove City, the city took ownership of the displays at issue, while in this case, the UHPA has retained ownership of the memorial crosses; (2) Utah has distanced itself from the message conveyed in these displays by issuing a statement that the Utah Department of Transportation neither approves or disapproves the memorial marker (Aplt.App. at 2303); and (3) unlike the displays at issue in Pleasant Grove City, these displays are not really permanent because both Utah and the UHPA retain the right to remove the display at any time. These distinctions are unpersuasive. The fact that the UHPA retains ownership over these displays does not materially affect our analysis of whether the displays at issue in this case constitute government speech. In Pleasant Grove City, the Supreme Court noted that the city had taken ownership of  most of the monuments in the Park. 129 S.Ct. at 1134 (emphasis added). However, the Court gave no indication that only those monuments which the city actually owned constituted government speech. To the contrary, the Court strongly implied that all the monuments in that park were government speech, and further indicated that, in the vast majority of cases, a permanent monument on public land will be considered government speech. Id. at 1138. The fact that the Court thought all of the monuments in that park were government speech is perhaps best illustrated by the Court's choice of an example of a permanent monument on public land that would not be government speech: a monument on which all the residents ... could place the name of a person to be honored or some other private message. Id. The Court's choice to use a hypothetical example, and not just to point to some of the memorials in the park at issue that might be privately owned in that case indicates that the Court considered all the monuments in that park to be government speech. Thus, the fact that the UHPA, not Utah, owns the memorial crosses does not affect our determination of whether they are government speech. Similarly, Utah's attempt to distance itself from the message conveyed by these memorial crosses, by stating that it neither approves or disapproves them, falls flat in light of the Supreme Court's discussion in Pleasant Grove City. In Pleasant Grove City, the Court explicitly rejected the respondent's argument that, in order for a monument to constitute government speech, the state must formally adopt the message conveyed by the display. The Court noted that the City's decision to display that permanent monument on its property provided a more dramatic form of adoption than the sort of formal endorsement that respondent would demand.... Id. at 1134. Conversely, the government's actions in this caseallowing these memorial crosses to be displayed with the official UHP insignia primarily on public landcannot be overshadowed by its attempts to distance itself from the message conveyed by these displays. Finally, we reject the state amici's contention that, because the UHPA and Utah each retained the right to remove these displays, they are not permanent and, therefore, the Court's decision in Pleasant Grove City does not cover this case. This project began more than ten years ago, and there is no evidence that any of the memorial crosses erected since that time have been removed. We think that is permanent enough to constitute government speech. See id. at 1138 (contrasting the permanent displays at issue in that case with the temporary sixteen-day display at issue in Capitol Square Review and Advisory Board v. Pinette, 515 U.S. 753, 115 S.Ct. 2440, 132 L.Ed.2d 650 (1995)). [8]