The Ten Commandments have not only exercised and continued to exercise sweeping moral influence on our society, but they are actually, historically speaking, the foundation of Western concepts of law, deeply instrumental in forming the common law of England (or the canon law of France) upon which American legal systems were formed. Does freedom require rewriting our history and excising the sources of our institutions from public knowledge and acknowledgement? I don't think so.

Try this thought experiment: Imagine Judge Moore had wanted to place a huge rock inscribed with, oh, I don't know ... the Code of Hammurabi, or stirring words from Kahlil Gibran, "Go placidly amidst the noise and confusion of life." No constitutional claim would have arisen. Under prevailing doctrines, symbols that reflect Christian beliefs tend to be peculiarly penalized in the public square, precisely because most Americans are Christians: Only majority symbols credibly risk violating the court's interpretation of the establishment clause.

But the same First Amendment protects diverse political viewpoints as well as religious liberty. The idea that a statue of the Ten Commandments constitutes an establishment of religion, depriving citizens who disagree with it of their rights, is no more tenable than that, say, the display of the Declaration of Independence violates the rights of those with other political views and creeds.

And Brian Chavez-Ochoa is right in a particular sense. Who is likely to be offended by the sight of the Ten Commandments? Not believing Jews, Christians or Muslims, all of whom acknowledge the Old Testament as sacred scripture. Not, in my experience, Hindus or Buddhists, most of whom tend to be quite comfortable with others' expressions of religious beliefs and who acknowledge moral law comes from God, too.

No, the people who are offended by the sight of this stone are the secularists, the people who do not believe in God. And if Judge Moore loses, ultimately they will get their own faith enshrined as sacred in the public square.