The O'Reilly Factor - Fox News - Jay Sekulow Talks With Bill O'Reilly About Ten Commandments Cases

THE O'REILLY FACTOR
Fox News
March 2, 2005

BILL O'REILLY: "The Factor," follow-up segment tonight, the Supreme Court heard arguments today about the constitutionality of posting the ten commandments on public property. Big controversy, as you know.

And joining us now from Washington is Jay Sekulow, the chief counsel for the American Center for Law and Justice. The counselor is directly involved with the case. So what happened today?

JAY SEKULOW, AMER CTR. FOR LAW & JUSTICE: Well, these were the culmination of a lot of litigation around the country brought by the ACLU on the ten commandment displays in a variety of contexts. Bill, there's 4,000 of these paternal order monuments. That was discussed and debated today in the courtroom.

And then the second case involved a - what we called the foundations of law display out of a courthouse in a county in Kentucky. So two cases, one an exterior monument, And the other an interior foundation of law. Has the Declaration of Independence, a number of other documents as well as the ten commandments.

O'REILLY: OK, but anything with God in it is under fire, primarily from the ACLU.

SEKULOW: Right.

O'REILLY: And now the Supreme Court is with one over arch is going to handle all of this stuff and define what can and can't be posted in public buildings.

SEKULOW: Absolutely right. And I'll tell you something. To the right of -- when you argue these cases to your -- to the lawyer's right is a depiction engraved in the marble of Moses holding tablets with the words of the 10 Commandments written in Hebrew. There were more discussions...

O'REILLY: Yes. I mean, they can just look up and see it.

SEKULOW: ...about Moses today than anything else.

O'REILLY: Yes, they look up, and they can see him, and this is a tradition in our country, and everybody knows it. Also, everybody knows the ACLU wants a different country. They don't want the traditional country that we have.

SEKULOW: You're absolutely right.

O'REILLY: Yes, but I -- I think the Supreme Court justices are well aware of that, too. Everybody -- ACLU isn't subtle. I mean, they want a totally different country.

SEKULOW: No, certainly not.

O'REILLY: They want to break it down and then rebuild it, and that's what they want to do.

Now your...

SEKULOW: They actually said, Bill -- you would appreciate this. They actually said in their arguments today that having the 10 Commandments displayed in any context pretty much is a violation of the law, even in instruction and educational purposes.

O'REILLY: Sure.

SEKULOW: Yes.

O'REILLY: Sure, they believe the 10 Commandments reflect the religion of Christianity and Judaism, and they don't want that in public displays.

SEKULOW: Right.

O'REILLY: They say that if you display Christianity and Judaism, then you've got to display Buddhism and Shintoism and on and on.

But what's your strongest argument?

SEKULOW: Well...

O'REILLY: What do you guys think is going to be the persuader, because it's going to be 5-4 either way.

SEKULOW: Yes. And I think that's right.

O'REILLY: Yes, I...

SEKULOW: It's going to be very close.

O'REILLY: It's going to be 5-4 either way. You've got the secularists on the court with Bader Ginsburg.

SEKULOW: Right.

O'REILLY: You know who they are. And then you've got, you know, the conservatives who are going to go your way, and then there's a couple of swing votes. What's your strongest argument?

SEKULOW: I'll tell you the argument that seemed to hit the mark today, that even affected Justice Ginsburg and Justice Breyer, and that was that the 10 Commandments are uniquely almost a philosophical statement as much as a religious one and a legal precedent.

This is a symbol of law. You don't even have to know the contents of the 10 Commandments to know that it's a code of conduct, and that really seemed to work.

O'REILLY: The problem with that, though -- the problem with that is that two of the commandments deal directly with the deity.

SEKULOW: No doubt about that. And we didn't run away from that. We were very clear. And a friend of mine who argued the case out of Kentucky, Matt Staver, was very specific about saying, look, there's no doubt that this is a sectarian text, but it's a sectarian text that has a secular implication.

So the idea, of course, is -- you've got this right -- the ACLU's bottom line position is if there's any mention of God at all -- or in even the context of the 10 Commandments, it can't be done -- there's no room to accommodate or have room for religious thought in the whole process, according to the ACLU.

O'REILLY: Well, I wouldn't even...

SEKULOW: But I don't think the court thought...

O'REILLY: I wouldn't even say the word "religious," and you can take this, if this you want. I use "spiritual."

SEKULOW: Well, I think that's right.

O'REILLY: There's no room for any spiritual thought in the public marketplace because the ACLU immediately equates spirituality with a certain religion. That's the weakness of their argument that even Ruth Bader Ginsburg might understand, although I don't think she ever would.

SEKULOW: Well, it's interesting because the vote you're looking for, of course, in cases like this -- and you know this. You're looking for...

O'REILLY: Kennedy...

SEKULOW: ...Justice O'Connor and Kennedy, right.

O'REILLY: Right. Those are the guys.

SEKULOW: But, interesting, Justice Breyer and Justice Ginsburg said this, and I think it's really important. They both said, you know, when we look at these displays, we don't see anything that's really divisive here.

You know, sure, people may not want to look at the 10 Commandments, but they can just avert their eyes, and I think that caught a lot of the court's attention. So I think we've got...

O'REILLY: Well, I hope so.

SEKULOW: You know this. You never know with the Supreme Court in the United States, but I'm more optimistic...

O'REILLY: Right.

SEKULOW: ... coming out of the case than I was actually going into it.

O'REILLY: Yes, but they may be just bear baiting you, you know.

SEKULOW: Could be. You don't know.

O'REILLY: Just giving you a little of this.

SEKULOW: You never judge a case by an oral argument. No doubt about that.

O'REILLY: All right, Counselor. We appreciate it.

SEKULOW: Thanks, Bill.

O'REILLY: You'll be our go-to guy on this case. And, again, we'll put the ACLU on anytime they want, but they're all hiding under their desks and they don't want to come on, and that's tough. You know, they don't want to come on? They don't want to come on.

SEKULOW: Well, they were in the courtroom today. They just didn't stay very long.

O'REILLY: All right. Well, you tell them to come on "The Factor." It's a lot rougher than the courtroom.

SEKULOW: Very good.