Pastor has faith people will seal issue for good
By KIM CALVERT Special to the Daily Press
MID-CITY — A Santa Monica church that entered into the battle to preserve the cross on the county seal is keeping the faith.
Pastor Nathan Kill-ian and his 250-member congregation at Santa Monica’s Pilgrim Lutheran Church are plaintiffs in a lawsuit filed against Los Angeles County that claims the removal of the cross from the seal is a waste of taxpayer money and a violation of the First Amendment.
Church member and private attorney William J. Becker Jr., who took an active role in the cross controversy upon Pastor Killian’s request, initiated the lawsuit.
“I started by doing some research, made some phone calls and the more I found out, the angrier I got,” Becker said.
Becker said the lawsuit was put on hold last month by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Malcolm Mackey to await a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in a similar federal suit filed earlier by another group of public interest lawyers.
Several Pilgrim Lutheran Church members assisted in gathering signatures in a coun-tywide six-month campaign that fell 61,606 signatures short of the 170,606 needed to put the issue on the November ballot.
Had the effort been successful, Los Angeles County voters could have decided the fate of the cross themselves — rather than accept a 3-2 vote by the County Board of Supervisors to remove it.
Organizer David Hernandez, who led the signature campaign, this week filed the necessary paperwork to revive the petition drive. He said he expects to collect enough signatures within the six-month window required by county law to put the issue before the people.
Pastor Killian has faith that the power of the people will seal the issue once and for all.
“Our congregation is not political, but we do have a Christian concern for government, city, county and country,” Killian said. “My sermons are about the Kingdom of God, but at the same time, we’re charged to be good citizens.”
Killian said it wasn’t just a religious issue, but also one of history and heritage. One of several images on the seal that represents LA County’s historical influences, the cross symbolized the contributions of Spanish missionaries.
“It’s a rather small cross when you consider the whole seal,” Killian said. “But it’s as important to (local history) as the oil derricks and other pictures on there.”
Becker’s co-counsel in the action, which was filed in September 2004, include Dr. John C. Eastman of The Claremont Institute Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence, Manuel Klausner of the Individual Rights Foundation and attorney Donald Wagner.
Becker said the Claremont Institute was underwriting the legal costs on behalf of the plaintiffs, which include Pilgrim Lutheran Church, located on Wilshire Boulevard and 17th Street.
“Our lawsuit has a particular cause of action alleging taxpayer waste,” Becker said. “When the county elected to dismantle the county seal, they also elected to spend millions of dollars on a replacement.”
The controversy over the cross started when the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California threatened to sue the county and demanded the cross be removed from the county emblem.
In a letter sent to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on May 19, 2004, the ACLU argued the presence of the cross was a government endorsement of Christianity. Rather than face a lawsuit, the County Board of Supervisors voted in June 2004 to remove the cross from the emblem, according to an ACLU spokesperson.
Despite the setbacks, Becker said his church wouldn’t be deterred.
“It’s an uphill battle,” he said. “But we won’t give up.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on March 19, 2005. Read the original PDF.