Chandeliers and the Law at the Temple of Justice
Part Six
The image of the tablet of the law is the final symbol in this six part blog series, “Chandeliers and the Law at the Temple of Justice,” about the symbols on the Tiffany & Co. chandeliers in the Courtroom and Main Reading Room at the Temple of Justice.
The symbol shows a tablet carved with the first ten roman numerals, I through X. This may be a reference to the marble frieze above the bench in the United States Supreme Court, a sculpture containing a pylon with the same ten roman numerals. Artist Adolph A. Weinman wrote that the numerals represented the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution, also known as the Bill of Rights. The image may also be a reference to the Ten Commandments. The south wall frieze in the courtroom of the Supreme Court includes an image of Moses holding the Ten Commandments with the numbers for commandments six through ten visible in Hebrew characters. The frieze includes other great classical lawgivers including Hammurabi, Solomon, Confucius, and others.
The existence of the Ten Commandments in courthouses is a frequently litigated issue under the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Most recently, the U.S. Supreme Court addressed the issue in Van Orden v. Perry, 545 U.S. 677 (2005) and McCreary County, Ky. v. American Civil Liberties Union of Ky., 545 U.S. 844 (2005). In Van Orden, in a five to four decision, Chief Justice Rehnquist held that a Ten Commandments monument placed on the grounds of the Texas State Capitol in 1961 did not violate the Establishment Clause. In comparison, writing for a five justice majority in McCreary, Justice Souter held that determining the counties’ purpose in displaying the new posters of the Ten Commandments in highly visible areas in courthouses was a sound basis for ruling on whether they violated the Establishment Clause and that a preliminary injunction against the display was adequately supported by evidence of religious intent. Nonetheless, Justice Souter noted:
Nor do we have occasion here to hold that a sacred text can never be integrated constitutionally into a governmental display on the subject of law, or American history. We do not forget, and in this litigation have frequently been reminded, that our own courtroom frieze was deliberately designed in the exercise of governmental authority so as to include the figure of Moses holding tablets exhibiting a portion of the Hebrew text of the later, secularly phrased Commandments; in the company of 17 other lawgivers, most of them secular figures, there is no risk that Moses would strike an observer as evidence that the National Government was violating neutrality in religion.
Recently, in American Legion v. American Humanist Association, 139 S.Ct. 2067 (2019), the Supreme Court addressed the issue of religious monuments on public land, this time holding that a three-story Latin cross erected in 1925 in Bladensburg, Maryland as a memorial to soldiers who died in World War I did not violate the Establishment Clause. The seven opinions written in the case show the continued fractured nature of Establishment Clause jurisprudence.
In addition to the tablets, a hand symbol shows the Latin gesture of benediction. A 10th century mosaic in the Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul in Agliate, Lombardy, Italy, showing St. Peter making the sign of benediction while holding a key, is illustrative of many pieces of religious art throughout Europe. Interestingly, Dr. Bennett Futterman, a professor of anatomy at NYIT College of Osteopathic Medicine, analyzes the sign in an article in Clinical Anatomy and argues that, “Peter, the first pope, had an ulnar nerve injury and everyone copied him. Imitation is a great form of flattery. Out of respect for St. Peter, the other popes followed with that same pattern.” Regardless of the history of the sign of benediction, it is entirely unclear why the artist who created the chandeliers superimposed this image on top of the tablets of the law. (RM)
