Federal Court Rules Against Christmas Nativity Scene

The curt ruling banned the Natviity Committee from creating a nativity scene like the one above. (Creative Commons/ Michael Quick)

UPDATE |Nov. 29, 2012,  8:03 P.M. PST:

The City of Los Angels received court approval to dismiss the  lawsuit brought by the Santa Monica Nativity Scene Committee.

The decisions said the city properly banned all private unattended displays in Palisades Park based on the grounds of administrative hardship.

" THis is a victory for atheists, anti-Christians and people who don't believe the First Amendments as much to religious speakers as it does to secular and anti-religious speakers," said attorney William Becker.

"Atheists are always saying that they are made to feel like outsiders because they don't have displays to rival the Nativity scene. Due to religious intolerance and complete lack of respect for traditions our culture has long enjoyed, Christians are now the outsiders."

The Nativity Scenes Committee was denied a bid to have a Christmas Nativity scenes in a Santa Monica park, according to sources.

The ruling broke a nearly 60-year-old tradition at Palisades Park by preventing the religious display.

The committee said the Santa Monica City Council infringed on the committee's right to free speech and freedom of religion under the First Amendment when it voted in June to ban the Christmas display from the park. The first display of the nativity scene was in 1953.

"It is always in the public's interest to prevent one from violating another's constitutional rights," said William J. Becker, Jr., lead counsel for the Plaintiff Committee.

"We believe the Christmas tradition of displaying the Nativity scenes as the Committee has done every year for 30 years and others had for 30 years before that shouldn't be interrupted while the Court decides this case."

Becker said that the city council's decision was unconstitutional because the council's actions stemmed from indirect suppression from atheists.

Last year, an atheist group dominated the lottery system to award display booths. Becker said they flooded the system with applications and the city then banned unattended displays at the park. Now that the Nativity Scenes Committee tried to secure a spot, the city council defended its decision based on its previous ban. Becker called this action a heckler's veto, or the suppression of one's groups rights in order to prevent the actions of another group.

"This amounts to an erosion of First Amendment speech rights," Becker said. "Religious speech enjoys as much protection in public spaces as secular speech.When you speak as an American, you are entitled to express your view points on anything within reason."

Vowing to appeal, Becker said he will believes the judge will dismiss the case at next month's hearing, or he will make an appeal.

"The city council has no backbone," said Becker. "The council's decision sends a message that religious speech is not allowed on public property."