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In a message dated 3/2/2005 12:45:13 PM Eastern Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
I don't know what docent you are talking to, but the Court's historian took me on a personal tour and explained to me at some length that the tablets in the front are not the ten commandments, but rather the "Bill of Rights," by which he meant the first ten amendments, of course. It is quite clear that Moses is on the right with 2 Commandments, not ten. It would make no sense for the Ten Commandments to appear twice on the friezes, given no other entity appears twice. The friezes make the obvious point that the ten commandments even decades ago were not thought to be the sole or even primary source of American law, but rather some of them have been relevant to general legal principles. Okay, I repent for saying silly supercilliousness. But wrong you are. If you, and the artist, want to say that the something numbered I through X is the first Ten Amendments to the Constitution, of course, you may do so. But when you, a professor of law, assert that something numbered I through X represents the "Bill of Rights," I believe it is appropriate to note that your interpretation is suspect on objective grounds of the mismatch in numbering.
On the larger question of what the art and artist say, and what the friezes mean, how widely open are you willing to push the door?
The Supreme Court was constructed during an era when the Fascistas were in power in Italy. The ability to employ native, American granites and other stone was important to the architect. But Italian marble then was, as today, reputed to be the finest in the world. Is the employment of fascista-produced marble intended to communicate a message? Does it communicate a message despite any contrary intent?
More to the point, if the artist hopes(d) to communicate a view that the Decalogue wasn't "all that," as the urban youth say today, he may have communicated as successfully as the burner of draft cards in the O'Brien case. The only lawgiver in the progress of the frieze with legible text is Moses, holding the Decalogue, with legibly readable hebrew text appearing on the tablet he holds. Why set Moses apart with this distinction if the point was that the Decalogue was no more important a source of law to us that the Code of Hammurabi (with its famous demand that an accused person jump into the river and, if he drowned, he was guilty and the accuser got his home as compensation; but if he survived, the accuser was to be executed (obviously not a juvenile) and his home given to the accused)?
And also worth noting, when were the Ten Amendments carved on a stone tablet? When did they, in fact, and not in texts, receive capitalized roman numbering?
Jim "I'm Willing To Dig, and I Got Me a Shovel" Henderson
Senior Counsel
ACLJ
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