Veterans memorials across the country are under siege, as militant atheist groups extend their ideological drive to eradicate all traces of religion from everyday life — especially Christianity — to even the most sacred of American public spaces.

In the past 15 years, numerous veterans memorials have been attacked by organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union, American Humanist Association, Freedom From Religion Foundation, and Americans United for Separation of Church and State for allegedly violating the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution, which bars the establishment of a state religion.

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In the cases of the two oldest and most well-known memorial controversies — the Mojave Desert Veterans Memorial Cross and the Mount Soledad Veterans Memorial, both in California — the forces of common sense prevailed. Both are still standing, albeit after decades-long legal battles instituted by the ACLU and, in the case of Mount Soledad, the sale of government land to a private owner.

Unfortunately, those victories aren’t necessarily the norm. In recent years, atheist groups have only increased efforts to remove Christian-themed veterans memorials — structures that either were a cross or bore one — and have in many cases been successful.

  • In Lake Elsinore, Calif., in March 2014, after a year-long legal battle initiated by the American Humanist Association, a veterans memorial was removed from the town-owned baseball park after being declared unconstitutional by a district judge.
  • In February 2014, the AHA sued for the removal of a 90-year-old WWI memorial in Bladensburg, Md. A decision from the courts is yet to be issued.
  • In August 2014, the Freedom From Religion Foundation filed a complaint over the presence of a 14-inch cross on a veterans memorial in Whitewater Memorial State Park in Liberty, Indiana. The fate of this memorial is also still to be decided.
  • In January, a veterans memorial featuring a cross in King, N.C., was removed after two years of back and forth in the courts. The initial legal complaint was filed by Americans United for Separation of Church and State.
  • This month, the City Council in Knoxville, Iowa, voted to remove a veterans memorial after pressure from the same organization. In August, a Desert Storm memorial in Boone County, Missouri, was removed after an AUSCS lawsuit was launched the previous year.

What allows these groups to succeed is what some would hold as a gross misinterpretation of the First Amendment. Ask the average person — and apparently the average judge — about the establishment clause, and they’ll tell you it guarantees the “separation of church and state.”

But the establishment clause of the First Amendment simply says that, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” Nowhere does it mention “separation of church and state.” It certainly does not say veterans memorials shall not depict religious imagery, or that religious imagery may not ever be displayed on local government or federal land.

It does not even say that Congress shall make no law respecting the promotion of religion. The only thing the clause specifically does is prevent Congress from establishing a religion run by the state.

It was once common in countries with established religions that one had to be a member of religion to have basic civil rights. This is precisely what the founders were trying to avoid. They were not trying to give atheists a means to live life without ever being exposed to the slightest trace of Christianity.

In fact, given the Establishment Clause is followed directly by the Free Exercise Clause — concerning the right to follow one’s religion — one can infer that the Founders felt the ability to exercise one’s religion freely is a fundamental right. If that is the case, when it comes down to disputes over public displays of religious imagery, the hordes of militant atheists may be the only people in those disputes actually threatening anyone’s rights.