The Nashville Feed

Kentucky Has the Commandments. Does That Really Help?

Kentucky lies in an often overlooked portion of the American map. It is not fully in the south, nor is it solidly a part of the north. It is too far east to be considered Midwest, but not far enough east to be coastal. It is not in the rust belt nor the corn belt, and it barely rests on the periphery of the Bible belt.

Kentucky is, however, positioned at the center of courthouse Ten Commandments cases.

In 2005, the Supreme Court found the Ten Commandments displays in Kentucky’s McCreary and Pulaski counties unconstitutional.

The decision marked the climax of six years of maneuvers through the courts. Despite the hard fought legal battles and the word of the nation’s highest court, the 2005 decision effectively settled very little. No new guidelines were established to help determine under what precise circumstances the Ten Commandments could be posted on government property.

Without clear guidance, several Kentucky courthouses have placed an abbreviated King James version of the ten religious guidelines into public display since the mid 90s. McCreary and Pulaski are only two of many.

There is a great deal of disagreement on precisely why this Biblical text is finding a home in so many courthouses, but the morality theme seems to be the most recurrent. There seems to be an inclination that viewing these rules for the faithful will make us all better citizens.

In Mercer County a statement accompanying the commandments proclaims: “The Ten Commandments provide the moral background of the Declaration of Independence….”

Even Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia has cited morality when discussing the Decalogue.

“All it (the Ten Commandments) stands for is the proposition that the moral order is ordained by God," Scalia stated during the McCreary vs. ACLU oral arguments.

Does the display of the Ten Commandments actually influence the morality of the people in the county? Is there an impact on the actual frequency of the forbidden acts?

I’ll run some numbers to find those answers in the next installment of this four part series. Check back Wednesday.