Erasing Us from History

I'm beginning to think that the objective, indicated in its name, of the American Civil Liberties Union is to unify all judgments of civil liberties under the control of a limited few. The organization is truly beginning to let slip the fanaticism according to which it operates:

The American Civil Liberties Union wants to take religion out of the Los Angeles County seal. ...

At issue is the seal designed by the late Supervisor Kenneth Hahn that contains a tiny cross symbolic of the Catholic missions that are so much a part of the county's history.

In a letter to the supervisors, ACLU Executive Director Ramona Ripston says the cross is unconstitutional and has given them two weeks to act.

The ideologues who have taken control of the ACLU (assuming they haven't always had it) will not be satisfied until they have erased Christianity from American history. Eugene Volokh has more on the seal in question, including a picture. Personally, I think a county ought to be able to display religious symbols as religious symbols, but that's a fair debate, and one that can take its time resolving. But when a powerful, well-funded organization persists in picking through the documents, symbols, and monuments in every crack of the American governmental system, it's time for reasonable citizens to disavow the group.

The frightening part is that the L.A. county controversy is a parlay, for the ACLU, of success at changing public self-definition through raw intimidation:

The genesis of the spat began with a controversy about the city seal of Redlands, which contained a cross. Last February, two Redlands residents complained to the ACLU that the cross was a religious symbol. ACLU lawyer Ben Wizner wrote to the city that the U.S. Supreme Court had declared such symbols on government logos and seals unconstitutional.

Redlands capitulated when faced with a lawsuit and ordered the cross removed from every city logo.

Here's more on that controversy, including a picture. The objection of two residents was sufficient to modify the shared symbol of the town. Civil liberties for two means that all process, all votes, all consensus is moot. Twist some matter around to phrase one's desire in terms of rights, and no democratic principle can stand in the way.

The only pertinent question is how we begin to wake up our neighbors to the creeping legistopoly.