ABSTRACT
The Stone decision, courts have struggled with the question of whether it is ever permissible to display the Ten Commandments on public property. The secular application of the Ten Commandments is clearly seen in its adoption as the fundamental legal code of Western civilization and the common law of the United States. The statute provided that the required copies be purchased with voluntary contributions to the state treasury. The Supreme Court issued only a per curiam decision, a procedural device by which the Court simultaneously grants review and reaches the merits of the case without giving the parties the opportunity to file briefs or to argue orally before the Court. The Court noted that although the Ten Commandments could be permissibly integrated into a school curriculum to advance study, a display had no such purpose except to "induce the schoolchildren to read, meditate upon, perhaps to venerate and obey, the Commandments .
