Centerfield

It's not clear from your post on what basis you differentiate between "Choose Life" and "Save the Whales." Could you please explain? (For the record, I'm pro-whales and pro-choice.)

I don't actually recall precisely what our "whales" plate says, probably something banal about the environment.

My impression is that we have a pretty expansive state policy on such plates, and that we steer them towards uncontroversial messages like "Go Red Sox" and "Nature is Good."

I suppose you could consider the whale plate political, but I don't think it actually says save the whales, I think getting one acts as a mechanism for a charitable contribution to a wildlife fund. So again, maybe therte's a political taint, but in general it seems to me that controversy is a good thing for states to steer clear of in license plates.

BK,

Your again getting tied up with the concept that everything that's a bad idea should be illegal. That's not how our system of government works.... people and institutions (including government) are allowed to do all sorts of stupid, ill-advised things without those things being actually illegal.

Very few people would think it's a good idea to make chilli-filled chocolate-peanut butter cups or produce a Wlliam Shatner, classic rock' n' roll album..... but should such actualy be illegal?

In our system, Justices are not monarchs. They are not supposed to decide upon good policy or bad policy (that's the job of elected officials). Their job is to interpret, enforce and apply the laws..... and specificly to protect the rights of individual citizens.

Now the 1st Ammendment is designed to protect peoples freedom to express themselves and to prevent the Government from establishing or promoting a particular religious viewpoint. However, no where in the 1st Ammendment or elsewhere will you find anything about the government endorsing a particular political viewpoint or even ethical viewpoint as long as it is not an inherently religious one.

I'm sorry to dissapoint you but "Choose Life" is no more an inherintly religious viewpoint then "Save the Whales", "Just say NO to drugs", "Stay in School", "Drive Courteously", "Live Free or Die" or yes indeed "Go Sox". It is a political/ethical viewpoint, one which people of all faiths, including aethiests and agnostics are fully capable of ascribing to. It may be an incredibly contentious viewpoint, it may be one which offends your (and a significant portion of the publics) sensibilities. As such it is probably an incredibly ill-advised and poorly considered decision for the state to allow it on the license plate. However, it is most certainly NOT a violation of the 1st Ammendment and no Court should find it such just because they think Ten. state officials are making an incredibly bad policy decision....... anymore then a Court should rule that a defendents DNA is a match when the scientific evidence says otherwise...just because the Court might happen to believe that the defendant is a bad man.

Cengel,

Bull. This is demonstrably a case of the government establishing a primarily religious viewpoint. It absolutely is MORE inherently religious than the other viewpoints you compare it to. The courts have not fallen for fundamentalists trying to clothe creationism as science by calling it intelligent design. They shouldn't fall for you declaring a primarily religious viewpoint to be a simple matter of philosophy, and declaring all such matters therefore equal. (As you may not know, hierarchically speaking, philosophy pretty much subsumes all areas of mental inquiry below it, including science, theology, and politics, and just about every other -ology. Which makes your point kind of trivial. Seriously. And please note that I am not saying that to be nasty or clever or insulting. It's really just the way philosophy structures intellectual inquiry.)

It is a political/ethical viewpoint, one which people of all faiths, including aethiests and agnostics are fully capable of ascribing to.

I agree, it is a viewpoint which people of all faiths, including athiests and agnostics CAN subscribe to. However, as I alluded to just above, every possible mental viewpoint under the sun fits this description...a viewpoint which people CAN subscribe to...

I don't understand why you think that's the appropiate test. It's not a question of whether people CAN subscribe to it, it's question of which people actually DO subscribe to it.

And as you know and would probably freely admit, it's not a viewpoint which people subscribe to at the same rate regardless of faith, it's one that finds predominant (although not exclusive) favor among religious conservatives, so it's one that the state should avoid establishing by giving an official imprimateur.

Your again getting tied up with the concept that everything that's a bad idea should be illegal.

If you want to say that I'd prefer a more stringent policy against government establishment of religion, that's fine. If you want to say I'd ban more things than you would, I might be able to let that pass, even if I wonder whether that's really true. But please don't put nonsense in my mouth or in my head. If you could, please refrain from ascribing this nonsensically simplistic notion to me. In case you've missed it umpteen times before, I declare it right here and right now to be abject nonsense, and categorically deny that I ascribe to it or "get tied up in it" as you put it. Every time that you ascribe it to me in the future, you'll be ignoring this straightforward and respectful request. Thanks in advance.

I think that there is a solid establishment clause argument to be made, and I've said so. Perhaps you could address the issue of whether the plates are a case of establishing/privileging a particular religious viewpoint, instead of putting a nonsense notion in my head and then showing why the nonsense is nonsense. I mean really, what's all that garbage about chili and William Shatner? Big whoop, you showed that nonsense is nonsense, but it's not a notion that I have EVER supported. So what's the point? Haven't I built up even a minimal amount of good will in previous conversations that you would refrain from putting a ridiculous straw man in my place?

IMO, the only plausible argument that this is Ok is that the constitution's establishment clause applies only to the fed govt, and a given state government's rules on establishment are governed solely by that state's constitution, and the state in question doesn't ban establishment.

In that case, I'd grant that the relevant state law might allow it. This may well even be the case, given the choice of the judges to say they are "unable to... ." In that case, my point would be that I think that each of the 50 individual states would be as well served by an establishment clause as the feds have been.

Maybe Simon or Pat or JDD can tell us how Tennessee's constitution has interpreted its establishment clause. Apparently it exists in section 3 (which says the state can't pick a favorite flavor). But the relevant test is probably not the wording but how it's come to to be interpreted via precedent.