Lift High the Cross?: Contrasting the New European and American Cases on Religious Symbols on Government Property

A comparative anthropologist could not have asked for a better script: two high profile cases, one before the European Court of Human Rights, the other before the U.S. Supreme Court, each involving challenges to traditional displays of crosses on government property. The European high court struck down the cross. The American high court upheld the cross. Both cases are procedurally complicated and are factually distinguishable.

Together, these two Articles illustrate some of the complexity of the legal issues surrounding the place of religious symbols on government land, and how serious scholars and judges can take opposing views and marshal reasoned arguments for each of them.