The Old Secular Cross?

High Court to Consider Issue of Church-State Separation

Henry and Wanda Sandoz are the unofficial caretakers of the Mojave cross, which is covered in a plywood box, near Cima, Calif. (Robert Barnes - The Washington Post)

By Robert Barnes
Washington Post

MOJAVE NATIONAL PRESERVE, Calif. -- It would be easy to miss among the yucca and Joshua trees of this vast place -- a small plywood box, set back from a gentle curve in a lonesome desert road. It looks like nothing so much as a miniature billboard without a message.

But inside the box is a 6 1/2 -foot white cross, built to honor the war dead of World War I. And because its perch on a prominent outcropping of rock is on federal land, it has been judged to be an unconstitutional display of government favoritism of one religion over another.

Whether the Mojave cross is ever unveiled again -- or taken down for good -- is up to the Supreme Court led by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. Next week, it will get its first major chance to divine the meaning of the First Amendment command that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion."

If the court reaches the constitutional issues at hand, all sides agree it could provide clarity to the court's blurry rules on church-and-state separations. It could also carry important implications for the fate of war memorials around the country that feature religious imagery -- the Argonne Cross in Arlington National Cemetery, for instance, or the Memorial Peace Cross in Bladensburg.

The Mojave cross's protectors, which include veterans groups and the federal government, say the symbol is a historic, secular tribute; its original plaque from the 1930s said it was erected to honor "the dead of all wars." They argue that Congress has taken the steps to distance itself from any appearance of endorsing a religious display.

But the American Civil Liberties Union, Jewish and Muslim veterans, and others say government actions have only deepened the problem. In an effort to avoid the lower courts' rulings that it must come down, Congress has designated the site the country's only official national memorial to the dead of World War I, elevating it to an exclusive group of national treasures that includes the Washington Monument and Mount Rushmore.

Congress's actions ensures that "the cross necessarily will reflect continued government association with the preeminent symbol of Christianity," the ACLU said.

It seems an improbable importance for this piece of desert land, where temperatures regularly hit three digits, an hour can go by without a passing car and somewhere nearby is likely to be a Mojave Green, the desert's own highly lethal variety of rattlesnake.

"It's just a little cross in the middle of nowhere," said Wanda Sandoz, who with her husband Henry is the cross's unofficial caretaker. Henry built the cross that currently occupies the spot -- there have been three -- and the Sandozes say they are fulfilling a WWI veteran's dying request to look after things.

Hiram Sasser, a lawyer with the Liberty Legal Institute, which represents the Veterans of Foreign Wars and assists the Sandozes, agreed.

"I always say you have to risk life and limb to be offended by this cross," he said.

It is unlikely the veterans who erected the cross knew or cared that Sunrise Rock was on federal land. World War I vets had flocked to the desert, either for mining opportunities or because doctors had suggested the climate for those with "shell shock" or respiratory problems from the war.

The men started VFW chapters throughout the region, and apparently were drawn to this particular granite outcropping because some looked at the rock's shadings and conjured up the silhouette of a WWI doughboy. The original cross had a plaque, complete with a misspelling:

"The Cross, Erected in Memory of the Dead of All Wars, erected in 1934 by Members Veterans of Foregin [sic] Wars, Death of Valley Post 2884."

That cross is gone, replaced first by a wooden one, and then by one Henry Sandoz erected in 1998, which he copied from studying old photographs.

Despite what supporters say was its secular birth, the cross for years has been the scene of Easter sunrise services, and the challenges began in 1999, when the U.S. Park Service denied an application from a Buddhist to build a shrine nearby. Frank Buono, an assistant superintendent, informed his boss that the presence of the cross violated the Constitution's establishment clause.

Buono is Catholic, but he said he was offended by the religious display on federal land. "The cross is important to me because it is the indispensable symbol of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ," Buono said in an interview. "But it isn't right that the symbol of my religion, or any religion, be permanently affixed to federal land."

Park officials agreed to take down the cross, but before they could act, Congress and the courts got involved. Congress forbade the Park Service from using any funds to remove the display. A district judge agreed with Buono that he had standing to bring his complaint and that the cross violated constitutional standards. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit affirmed the decision.

Then Congress declared the site a national memorial, and proposed to cure any constitutional problems by transferring one acre on which the cross stands to the VFW in exchange for five acres owned elsewhere in the preserve by the Sandozes.

But Buono and the ACLU went to court again, and the courts agreed that such a plan would not resolve the constitutionality question. The deal "would leave a little donut hole of land with a cross in the midst of a vast federal preserve," the appeals court said.

While the fighting has gone on, the cross has remained in place. But to comply with the court's ruling, it was covered first by a tarpaulin bag and now by the plywood box.

The Supreme Court has had trouble coming up with an easily followed guideline on religious displays on government land. Instead, it has opted to issue opinions based on the specifics of a case. Thus, the court in 2005 ruled 5 to 4 that a large, granite Ten Commandments monument on the grounds of the Texas capitol, in place for decades and surrounded by other historical markers, could remain. The same day, the court ruled by the same margin that recently installed framed copies of the Ten Commandments in two Kentucky courthouses were unconstitutional.

But changes on the court could make it more difficult for those challenging religious monuments. Justice Sandra Day O'Connor voted to find both displays of the Ten Commandments unconstitutional, but she has been replaced by Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., who seems more sympathetic to the other view.

"I can't see many votes for removing the cross," said Charles Haynes, an expert on the establishment clause at the First Amendment Center. Justices could short-circuit the constitutional issues by deciding the lower courts were wrong in granting Buono standing to challenge the cross.

President Obama's new solicitor general, Elena Kagan, inherited the case from the Bush administration and intends to argue it herself. She told the court in her brief that Buono no longer lives near the preserve and his objection to the cross -- that it was on federal land -- is remedied by the land swap.

Buono's lawyer, Peter Eliasberg of the Southern California chapter of the ACLU, said Congress's efforts to avoid taking down the cross make it even clearer that it the cross is endorsed by the government. He rejected arguments that the image of the cross was a historical, rather than religious, symbol of sacrifice.

"When the government chooses a cross to recognize the veterans of World War I, which included 250,000 Jews, which included my grandfather, that is an important message and an inappropriate message for the government to send," Eliasberg said.

Wanda Sandoz, meanwhile, is surprised by the legal battle over the monument. "I suppose I can see the point, if I was Jewish or Buddhist," she said recently, as she walked around Sunrise Rock. "But the thing is, we didn't choose the cross -- the veterans did. I guess if they had picked a Star of David, that's what we'd be taking care of today."

The court will hear arguments in Buono v. Salazar on Oct. 7.

Snake season coming

RYAN ORR Staff Writer
Victorville Daily Press





Mojave (Green) Rattlesnake Crotalus scutulatus


ADELANTO — With snake season quickly approaching, more Mojave Green Rattlesnakes are expected to be roaming the Victor Valley this year.

Last year there were very few bugs, lizards and rodents, said Joe Banashek, a Mojave field researcher from Adelanto. This year, he expects there to be a lot more of those, which will draw out a lot more snakes.

“There will definitely be more bites this year,” said Banashek.

Because of the greenery and general yard maintenance, residents — especially in rural areas — will be at a higher risk this year because of the increased number of snakes, Banashek said.

Although there is expected to be an increased number of Mojave Greens this year, next year Banashek said he expects to see even more.

The Victor Valley includes the habitats of not only the Mojave Green, but also the Southern California Rattlesnake. Both highly venomous.

“Every snake bite and every person is different,” Banashek said. “If it hits a vain, you could be dead in a matter of 15 minutes.”

Banashek said that if someone is bitten, they should remove any tight-fitting jewelry or clothes and have someone call so that they can be airlifted to the hospital.

No one should attempt to drive themselves to the hospital or try to suck out the venom.

“The idea is basically enjoy nature, but leave it alone, when at all possible,” Banashek said.

Snake safety tips:

• If you see a snake, back away from it
• If you are bitten, do not attempt or have anyone else attempt to suck the venom out
• Immediately take off any tight-fitting jewelry or clothing
• Call 911 or have someone call them for you and request to be taken to the nearest hospital
• Do not attempt to drive yourself to the hospital

True Grit - Cattle Ranching in the Mojave Desert Under Siege

It's never been easy for cattle ranchers in the rugged western Mojave. Now laws designed to protect the desert tortoise threaten to end their cowboy way of life.

MELANIE FINN
Los Angeles Times

Miles of it. Sand, rock, mesquite bush, yucca and sky. Out where I-40 blasts east through the Mojave Desert and Route 247 heads south onto the sun-baked plain of Lucerne Valley. Miles of nothing.

No, miles of cattle country.

"This is great country for them," says Bill Mitchell, a local rancher out on a roundup astride his feisty appaloosa, Chief. It's a 90-degree day, and the rough desert ground is thick with rattlesnakes--Mojave greens, the lethal kind. But the cattle know how to avoid the snakes, they know what to eat and where to drink, Mitchell explains. The warmer climate allows for year-round grazing, and the dryness helps prevent disease.

Indeed, his cows look sleek and content as he patiently guides a dozen of them toward his home base, Two Hole Springs Ranch, at the mouth of Rattlesnake Canyon in Lucerne Valley. Mitchell speaks softly to them, a mantra, "Easy now, easy now."

He's been talking to cows since his childhood. He learned to rope, ride and wrangle on his grandfather's Mojave ranch, Horsethief Springs. In 1986, Mitchell bought his own ranch, Pilot Knob near China Lake. A decade later, he sold "PK" and bought Two Hole Springs.

"Working cattle is the only thing I've ever wanted to do in my life," he says.

In his cowboy hat and jingle-bob spurs, Mitchell seems a reminder of another age, a time when San Bernardino and Riverside were known as "the cow counties." In the 1920s, there were 30 ranches spread out over the Mojave, each ranch comprising several hundred thousand acres. Two Hole Springs, with 53,000 acres and 86 head of cattle, is one of six that remain.

As the century draws to a close, Mitchell and his fellow ranchers have no wish to become anachronisms--or worse, landless. These are men and women who believe in hard work and self-sufficiency, who profess an intense love for this harsh landscape. But their livelihood and way of life are under increasing pressure from various conservation organizations, which say the fragile desert ecosystem is definitely not good country for cattle.

Most of the land on these Mojave ranches is leased from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, the government agency overseeing federal lands. All but five acres of Mitchell's Two Hole Springs belongs to the bureau and is, therefore, subject to a host of new grazing restrictions resulting from the 1989 listing of the desert tortoise as an endangered species.

Regulations Are 'Piling Up'

As the ranchers see it, groups such as the Desert Tortoise Preserve Committee seek to enforce the Endangered Species Act on these federal lands to an extent that ranching could become economically nonviable in most of the western Mojave.

"A lot of days I'm going through all these new regulations piling up on my desk and I get to thinking, 'Do I want my son and grandson to wrangle with all this?' " says Dave Fisher, president of the High Desert Cattlemen's Assn. for 14 years. A taciturn man in his 50s, he runs 500 head of permanent range cows on his ranch of 30,000 private and 90,000 federal acres. His father started ranching this area in 1927.

"I think maybe we're not long for this world," he says.

Fisher adds quickly and defiantly, "But then I think, 'No, I'm not going anywhere.' "

He's speaking from a cell phone in his truck, 30 miles in any direction from another human being. It's 7 in the evening. His day started at 4 a.m., he's been in the saddle for 10 hours. And he's smiling: "I love this life. I wouldn't change places with anyone on this planet."

The sparse vegetation necessitates such mind-boggling acreage. The range is open, and cattle are free to wander where they will. The Bureau of Land Management restrictions aim to prevent overgrazing. Each cow is allotted a certain number of acres, ranging anywhere from one head per eight acres to only one head per 50 acres. And if there's no rain, the bureau can close down or curtail any grazing on federal lands. Ranchers would then have to downsize their herds, auctioning extra cattle until it rains and the bureau reopens the acreage.

Even without the bureau restrictions, area ranchers say they would rather sell off their herds than overgraze.

"It's in our best interest to take as good a care as we possibly can of the land," Mitchell says. "Whether it be federal or private, it's our resource. We depend on it."

A long-term drought could all but close down a ranch. This dependence on the weather and on this wild, lean land seems to define those who choose to live here. "Life is simple and hard," says Julie Mitchell, Bill's wife and the mother of their 2-year-old daughter, Serenity. "You learn to take whatever comes and to be grateful for everything--the rain, the morning."

The old adobe house on their ranch is without heat and electricity. They use a wood stove, solar panels and gas lamps. They cook on a barbecue under a huge Palo Verde tree. The view drifts east for hundreds of miles.

Most of the week Bill works a grinding 10-hour day as a heavy equipment operator based in Barstow; it's a well-paying job that enabled him to buy Pilot Knob and will allow him to live permanently on Two Hole Springs within the next few years. His cattle take up the rest of his time. The offspring from his base herd of 86 cows must all be caught, branded, vetted, castrated, weaned and occasionally loaded onto a trailer and sold--no mean feat when the average 6-month-old heifer weighs 500 pounds, has never seen a human and doesn't want to be moved.

Often, Julie is Bill's only ranch hand and the two of them ride miles of fence line checking for gaps and cuts. Even with a good fence, the cattle will roam off the ranch, and it can take days of hard riding to round them up and herd them back. Bill and Julie must also frequently check the dozens of water holes scattered throughout the ranch, which can become clogged or contaminated.

Source of Contamination

The contamination source is often human. Bill recalls finding a group of duck hunters with a beer cooler, sitting in their fold-out chairs by one of his water holes. The wild cattle won't approach the water with humans present, no matter how thirsty they are.

"I asked them how they'd feel if I came and camped in their backyard with my campfire and my horse and a couple of big bulls," he says.

Julie, a small-town girl from Illinois, is new to ranching but has embraced it for herself and her daughter. She used to work part time but now has her hands full with Serenity and the ranch.

She hopes to home-school Serenity.

"We don't want her to be excluded from a social life," Julie says, noting that Bill's three daughters from his first marriage were home-schooled at Pilot Knob but were active in local rodeos and youth events. "I really think kids should be living like this. They should be out running around and throwing rocks, not watching TV," she says.

"On ranches, kids are always involved," Bill says. "They learn the interconnectedness of things. If you ask them, 'Where does milk come from? Where does beef come from?' they're not going to say, 'The store.' "

One also learns to be aware in such a wild place, to step carefully. Julie remembers a morning this summer when she and Serenity were letting the doves loose from their cage: "I turned my back for a second to undo the latch, and I heard Serenity say, quite happily, ' 'nake, Mommy, 'nake.' " Julie turned to see her daughter standing over a Mojave green.

Moving very slowly, she picked up Serenity, backed away and called out to Bill, who then shot the snake.

People who endure such incidents as part of their daily lives are not easily intimidated. But "the conservationists"--as the Mitchells, Fishers and other ranchers politely refer to conservation organizations--have caused concern, even anger. And they've certainly prompted change.

Of the 6.2-million acres of the western Mojave in federal hands, 1.58 million acres were designated in 1992 by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as critical habitat for the threatened desert tortoise. The Bureau of Land Management then had to comply with various guidelines concerning land use in these designated areas. New restrictions were placed on cattle grazing in the hopes of reestablishing a healthy tortoise population.

Cattle's Effect on Ecosystem

According to Michael Conners, executive director of the Desert Tortoise Preserve Committee, the tortoise is particularly threatened by the damage that cattle can wreak on a fragile desert ecosystem.

Cattle tend to prefer riparian areas such as stream beds. So, although there may be one cow allotted for eight acres, chances are that cow, and cows from surrounding eight-acre allotments, will congregate around the water, compacting the soil and destroying the surrounding vegetation, Conners explains.

Conners is clear about his organization's goal: "We would like to see an end to all grazing in all critical tortoise habitat." He points out that the Endangered Species Act is a law and believes that the only reason why cattle are still grazing in designated areas is that ranchers are a powerful political lobby.

For the moment, however, the land bureau will continue to allow controlled cattle grazing. But the smorgasbord of new restrictions is making life increasingly difficult for the ranchers.

Bill Mitchell learned about designated habitat the hard way. In 1986 he bought Pilot Knob with 100,000 acres of Bureau of Land Management leases and 1,320 of private land for his 75 head. Three years later, when the western portion of his land was one of the first areas designated as critical tortoise habitat, he worked with Lee Delany, then area manager with the land bureau.

"We tried to come up with something that would work for both of us," Delany says. "It was a lot of additional work for Bill. He had to put up fencing and rotate cattle and reduce their numbers." But the cattle continued to wander into prohibited areas. By 1995, Bill retained only 20 head.

"I just couldn't keep going," he says. He finally decided to sell Pilot Knob--to a ready deep-pocket buyer: the Desert Tortoise Preserve Committee and its co-sponsor, the Wildlands Conservancy. While much of Two Hole Springs, Bill's new ranch, is also in designated critical habitat, the grazing restrictions are less severe and he hopes to maintain his current herd size.

Conners has little sympathy.

"It'll be a hundred years before Pilot Knob will be back to normal." He describes "normal" as a pristine, wildlife-healthy wilderness. As it is, the number of permanent range cattle has declined consistently over the last 50 years. According to Pete Lounsbury, agricultural biologist with the San Bernardino Department of Agriculture, the area held more than 13,500 range cattle in 1948. Last year, there were perhaps 1,600.

"It's a way of life more than anything," says Lounsbury, who empathizes with the Mojave ranchers but notes their economic contribution to the state is fairly minimal these days. "It's so tough. They've been fighting city hall one way or another for so long that now some are saying, 'The hell with it!' "