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In the Supreme Court of the United States No. 13-1061 In the Supreme Court of the United States MOUNT SOLEDAD MEMORIAL ASSOCIATION, PETITIONER v. STEVE TRUNK, ET AL. ON PETITION FOR A WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT BRIEF FOR THE FEDERAL RESPONDENTS IN OPPOSITION DONALD B. VERRILLI, JR. Solicitor General Counsel of Record ROBERT G. DREHER Acting Assistant Attorney General JOAN M. PEPIN Attorney Department of Justice Washington, D.C. 20530-0001 [email protected] (202) 514-2217 QUESTION PRESENTED Whether the Mount Soledad Veterans Memorial in San Diego, California, which features a memorial cross amid many other secular and religious symbols of patriotism, sacrifice, and remembrance, violates the Establishment Clause. (I) TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Opinions below ................................................................................ 1 Jurisdiction ...................................................................................... 1 Constitutional and statutory provisions involved ....................... 2 Statement ......................................................................................... 2 Argument ....................................................................................... 11 A. This case does not meet the standard for a writ of certiorari before judgment .......................................... 12 B. The court of appeals effectively invalidated an Act of Congress ................................................................. 14 C. The decision below cannot be squared with this Court’s precedents ............................................................ 17 D. The courts of appeals are divided on the correct interpretation of this Court’s recent cases involving passive monuments ........................................................... 27 Conclusion ...................................................................................... 31 Appendix — Statutory provisions ............................................ 1a TABLE OF AUTHORITIES Cases: ACLU v. Mercer Cnty., 432 F.3d 624 (6th Cir. 2005) ......... 27 ACLU Nebraska Found. v. City of Plattsmouth, Neb., 419 F.3d 772 (2005) ..................................................... 29 Card v. City of Everett, 520 F.3d 1009 (9th Cir. 2008) ....... 28 East Bay Asian Local Dev. Corp. v. California, 13 P.3d 1122 (Cal. 2000) ......................................................... 3 Green v. Haskell Cnty. Bd. of Comm’rs, 568 F.3d 784 (10th Cir. 2009) ............................................................... 28 Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602 (1971) ...... 6, 17, 18, 28, 29 McCreary County v. ACLU, 545 U.S. 844 (2005) ............... 27 Mount Soledad Mem’l Ass’n v. Trunk, 132 S. Ct. 2535 (2012) ................................................................. 10, 28, 30 (III) IV Cases—Continued: Page Murphy v. Bilbray: No. 90-134, 1997 WL 754604 (S.D. Cal. Sept. 18, 1997) ................................................................................ 3 782 F. Supp. 1420 (S.D. Cal. 1991), aff ’d sub nom. Ellis v. City of La Mesa, 990 F.2d 1518 (1993), cert. denied, 512 U.S. 1220, and 513 U.S. 925 (1994) ............................................................................... 3 Paulson v. Abdelnour, 51 Cal. Rptr. 3d 575 (Cal. Ct. App. 2006) ................................................................................ 4 Paulson v. City of San Diego: No. 89-0820, 2006 WL 3656149 (S.D. Cal. May 3, 2006) ................................................................................ 4 294 F.3d 1124 (9th Cir. 2002), cert. denied, 538 U.S. 978 (2003) ........................................................ 3 Salazar v. Buono, 559 U.S. 700 (2010) ......................... passim San Diegans for the Mt. Soledad Nat’l War Mem’l v. Paulson, 548 U.S. 1301 (2006) .............................................. 4 Skoros v. City of New York, 437 F.3d 1 (2006) .................... 29 Utah Hwy Patrol Ass’n v. American Atheists, Inc., 132 S. Ct. 12 (2011) ............................................................... 28 Van Orden v. Perry, 545 U.S. 677 (2005) .................... passim Constitution, statutes and rules: U.S. Const. Amend. I (Establishment Clause) ...................... 2 Act of Aug. 14, 2006, Pub. L. No. 109-272, 120 Stat. 770 (16 U.S.C. 431 note): § 1(1), 120 Stat. 770 ................................................. 5, 15, 25 § 1(2), 120 Stat. 770 ................................................ 5, 15, 25 § 1(3), 120 Stat. 770 ........................................... 5, 16, 20, 23 § 1(4), 120 Stat. 770 ..................................................... 25, 26 § 1(7), 120 Stat. 770 ....................................................... 5, 15 V Statutes and rules—Continued: Page § 2(a), 120 Stat. 770-771 .......................................... 5, 15, 20 § 2(c), 120 Stat. 771 ............................................................. 6 Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2005, Pub. L. No. 108-447, § 116(a), 118 Stat. 3346 (16 U.S.C. 431 note): § 116(a), 118 Stat. 3346 ................................................ 4, 14 § 116(b) and (c), 118 Stat. 3346 ........................................ 14 Sup. Ct. R. 11 ..................................................................... 12, 13 In the Supreme Court of the United States No. 13-1061 MOUNT SOLEDAD MEMORIAL ASSOCIATION, PETITIONER v. STEVE TRUNK, ET AL. ON PETITION FOR A WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT BRIEF FOR THE FEDERAL RESPONDENTS IN OPPOSITION OPINIONS BELOW The opinion of the district court (Pet. App. 1-6) en- tering judgment in favor of plaintiffs-respondents Steve Trunk, et al., and specifying a remedy is unre- ported. The opinion of the court of appeals denying en banc review (Pet. App. 10-38) is reported at 660 F.3d 1091. The panel opinion of the court of appeals (Pet. App. 39-102) is reported at 629 F.3d 1099. The initial memorandum decision and order of the district court (Pet. App. 103-161) is reported at 568 F. Supp. 2d 1199. JURISDICTION The judgment of the district court in favor of plain- tiffs-respondents Steve Trunk, et al., was entered on December 12, 2013. Defendant-petitioner Mount (1) 2 Soledad Memorial Association filed a notice of appeal on December 18, 2013. Defendants-respondents Unit- ed States of America, et al., filed a separate notice of appeal on February 7, 2014. The court of appeals consolidated the respective appeals on March 20, 2014. The jurisdiction of this Court is invoked under 28 U.S.C. 1254(1) and 2101(e). CONSTITUTIONAL AND STATUTORY PROVISIONS INVOLVED The First Amendment to the United States Consti- tution provides in pertinent part that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Relevant statutory provisions are reproduced in the appendix to this brief in opposition. App., infra, 1a-6a. STATEMENT 1. a. This case concerns the Mount Soledad Veter- ans Memorial (Memorial) in San Diego, California. Mount Soledad is an 822-foot-high hill located in the La Jolla community of San Diego, situated between the Pacific Ocean to the west and Interstate 5 to the east. Private citizens first erected a redwood cross on that land in 1913, but the current concrete cross was erected in 1954 by the Mount Soledad Memorial Asso- ciation (Association) and dedicated by the town council to the memory of veterans of World War I, World War II, and the Korean War. The cross is 29 feet tall and sits on a 14-foot base. It is surrounded by six concen- tric walls now displaying more than 2000 granite plaques that commemorate individual veterans or veterans’ groups. Pet. App. 45. The walkways be- tween the walls are paved with commemorative bricks, and the site is flanked by a tall flagpole and encircled 3 by 23 bollards that honor community and veterans’ associations. Ibid. The cross atop Mount Soledad stood unchallenged until 1989, when plaintiffs brought suit against the City of San Diego (City), which at the time owned the land on which the Memorial sits. The federal district court ruled that the Memorial violated the California Constitution and enjoined display of the cross. Mur- phy v. Bilbray, 782 F. Supp. 1420 (S.D. Cal. 1991). The Ninth Circuit, which at the time construed the Establishment Clause analogue in the California Con- stitution as “more separationist” than its federal coun- terpart, affirmed. Ellis v. City of La Mesa, 990 F.2d 1518, 1528 (1993), cert. denied, 512 U.S. 1220, and 513 U.S. 925 (1994).1 In response to that litigation, the City twice attempted to sell the property, but those sales were likewise enjoined by federal courts on state constitutional grounds. See Murphy v. Bilbray, No. 90-134, 1997 WL 754604, at *9-*11 (S.D. Cal. Sept. 18, 1997); Paulson v. City of San Diego, 294 F.3d 1124, 1132 (9th Cir. 2002) (en banc), cert. denied, 538 U.S. 978 (2003). b. In December 2004, Congress designated the Memorial as a national memorial to veterans. Specifi- cally, Congress provided that “[t]he Mt. Soledad Vet- erans Memorial * * * , which consists of a 29 foot- tall cross and surrounding granite memorial walls con- taining plaques engraved with the names and photo- graphs of veterans of the United States Armed Forc- 1 The California Supreme Court has subsequently held that the “protection against the establishment of religion embedded in the California Constitution” does not create “broader protections than those of the First Amendment.” East Bay Asian Local Dev. Corp. v. California, 13
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