Bible verse at Knoxville Police HQ to be removed after legal threat; mayor defends decision
"If God be for us, then who can be against us?"
Generations of Knoxville Police Department officers have passed by a plaque with that bit of scripture as they headed out to fight crime. Now, the sign is being taken down after an atheist organization based in Madison, Wis., demanded it be removed, the USA TODAY NETWORK-Tennessee has learned.
“I have walked through those doors for a lot of years and that sign has been there giving me strength, encouragement and comfort to do this job,” KPD Deputy Chief Cindy Gass wrote in an email to KPD employees announcing an official ceremony for the removal of the plaque set for 9:30 Friday morning.
City Law Director Charles Swanson said Tuesday that the East Tennessee chapter of the Freedom From Religion Foundation filed a complaint about the plaque, which quotes Romans 8:31 and is located on a wall near an employee deli. It is not in the public areas of the Safety Building, where KPD is headquartered on Howard Baker Jr. Boulevard.
At a Wednesday news conference, Knoxville Police Chief David Rausch said the plaque would be moved to a new Hall of Inspiration that the department will create inside the Safety Building.
Separation of church and state
Swanson said the city could have defended the plaque in court against the group’s claim it violates principles of separation of church and state. But he said he agreed with Knoxville Mayor Madeline Rogero’s position not to spend taxpayer money to fund that defense.
"We could argue in favor it keeping it, what’s the real point?” Swanson said. “I don’t think it was in a place where the public could see it. But it certainly didn’t seem like it was worth financing a fight.”
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Rogero said at Wednesday's news conference that the city determined the plaque crossed a "clearly established line" with government promoting a particular religion.
“As a person of faith, I understand and respect the passion that people feel on this issue,” she said. “As a Christian, I’m thankful for fellow Christians who feel their faith so strongly that they want to share it with the world and I respect people of other faiths who feel the same.
“But we do not govern according to the dictates of our faiths. We govern first and foremost under the authority of the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of Tennessee.”
Rogero said if the city thought they could win a lawsuit, they would spend the money.
“I could demagogue it. I could go ahead and stand there and say we’re going to fight it to the end, but if we know (and) everything tells you that this law has been established, that this is case law (and) we know what the outcome will be then why don’t we face it as a community and adjust as we have with this Hall of Inspiration,” she said.
Emails obtained by the USA TODAY NETWORK-Tennessee show KPD officers and civilian personnel were upset by the news and faulted Rogero for caving to the organization. Rausch defended her.
“Let me make something abundantly clear,” Rausch wrote. “The mayor has not ordered the sign to be removed. This is a legal decision based on current case law that has been researched by our law department.”
He said the mayor supports the officers’ work and “the importance of faith” in police work. The mayor's office did not immediately return requests for comment Wednesday morning.
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“I appreciate the passion I have witnessed with this news,” Rausch continued. “Please use it in a positive manner and not to blame those who have no role in this.”
In an earlier email, he said he shared officers' disappointment.
“After much wrestling and discussion, it has been determined that we will remove the sign and place it in our museum,” Rausch wrote. “Isn’t that a statement of our times?”
Rausch said he did not intend to offend officers who aren't Christians, “but this has been a tough decision.”
'Good over evil'
The chief said the plaque was never intended to promote religion but instead “was simply motivation to those who stand for good over evil, those of us who stand on that ‘thin blue line’ between right and wrong.”
“It was viewed as a motivational quote, no different than others that have come from respected leaders throughout our time,” the chief wrote.
Rausch affirmed his own Christian faith in the email and said he “will be praying for those who brought about this ‘issue’. I pray that their souls will be softened by the love of God, and they understand that they can have us remove words but they cannot remove our faith and what is in our hearts.”
Aleta Ledendecker sent a letter of complaint on behalf of the Freedom From Religion Foundation in February. She said one of the group’s members had contacted the organization about the plaque. She sent a total of three letters threatening a lawsuit.
“Having a Bible verse promotes one particular religion and in so doing is discriminatory toward those of other religions or no religion,” she wrote. “Please see that the verse is removed so that all who enter your police station may feel equally treated.
“Failure to have the verse removed may expose the KPD and/or the City of Knoxville to expensive litigation that cannot be won,” she continued.
Freedom From Religion
The group, founded by an atheist and her mother in 1976, has 20,000 members and 13 paid staffers. It operates on donations and threatens legal action over issues involving religion from school prayer to the display of the Ten Commandments and "In God We Trust" signs. It sometimes sues. It doesn’t always win. The group’s founder boasted a success rate of less than 50 percent in a Capitol Times interview in 2013.
Ledendecker spoke to reporters after the news conference
She said a Freedom From Religion member saw the plaque in February when entering the Safety Center to give a statement after witnessing a wreck.
“Anyone who doesn’t prescribe to Christianity would be subjected to a plaque that pretty much discriminates against them," she said.
"Can you imagine how Christians would feel if they walked in and instead of Christian plaque there was a plaque of Islam or Judaism?"
The group recently threatened legal action over the city's proposed $2 million donation to help fund a $10 million complex in Lonsdale Homes that will be owned by Christian organization, Emerald Youth Foundation.
Rogero and Swanson both said the city felt their effort to give infrastructure support for the facility did not support one religion over another, unlike the plaque.
The reaction
Don Wiser, a retired KPD investigator who served for 23 years, fondly recalled the plaque being mounted after the agency moved into the Howard Baker Jr. Boulevard building in 1969.
"I believe in Jesus, and I believe that when they turn their back on Jesus that we're going to be in bad shape," Wiser said. "I think that, as wicked as our people are getting, I think that's the wrong thing to do, to take that off there."
"Jesus has made a place for us," he continued. "But Satan's got a place for you too, and it gets awful hot in his place. I like air conditioning awful well."
Scott Smith represents Knoxville with the Tennessee Republican Party. He said the group is “troubled” by the city’s willingness to remove the plaque.
“It is baffling to us how this group in Wisconsin have been personally harmed by a plaque that has been hanging in the Knoxville Police Department’s Safety Center since 1969 … we also want to reiterate that every city mayor from 1969 until now has not had a problem with this.”
An online petition to keep the plaque that was started early Wednesday had nearly 1,000 signatures as of 7 p.m.
More information will be updated as it becomes available.