Should the Ten Commandments be posted in public schools? So far as I'm aware, there's a separation of church and state in this country. A story which aired on ABC WORLD NEWS showed the further obfuscation of this issue as evidenced by the Indiana ruling that the Ten Commandments be shown in public classrooms, coupled with the story of the Kentucky community suffering a rash of unemployment and crime.

This is not a two-sided issue, as determined early in the history of this nation. Our founding fathers had the wisdom of history on their side when determining it is folly to mix government and religion, for they understood that when the state begins to show a proclivity toward any given religion, all others must be given their say. Enjoy the Ten Commandments today, for tomorrow will come the demands from across the nation for Maoist and Taoist sayings, Hindu and Moony sayings, Jehovah's Witness and Branch Davidian sayings, and Muslim, Moslem, Mormon and atheistic sayings.

Since we are going for the quick-fix here by the posting of doctrine, why not look to the nation of Japan, where crime is virtually non-existent when compared to our own? I suspect that this community in search of quick answers to its problems would not stand idly by as the framed doctrines of Buddha are placed up and down the hallways of their schools. Yet by their own rationale, this is exactly what they should demand be done. I tremble to think of the day when government must begin the balancing and juggling act placed upon it by all religions demanding equal sponsorship in the classroom.

Despite the supreme court's rulings, there still seems to be a groundswell of support to rush headlong into what could only become the factionalization of public education in this country. The residents of this city proclaim they have no problem with the posting of the Ten Commandments in public schools, and the sheriff proudly displays them in his public building as well. The ACLU has filed suit, and the residents seem incredulous, and have taken to posting the Ten Commandments virtually everywhere throughout their city. After all, they say, we are a Christian community, so what's the problem?

Might I point out the obvious, to which the residents of this community seem oblivious? When the preaching of the Ten Commandments in your churches has failed, the teaching of the Ten Commandments in your homes has failed, and the displaying of the Ten Commandments everywhere throughout your community has failed, why am I left to assume that the mere posting of the Ten Commandments in your schools will suddenly do the trick? When the first three precepts, which should have been most effective in curbing crime, have failed, I'm lost as to the justification of the fourth. And, might I ask, where are the statistics to show the gigantic increase in juvenile crime in this community?

Since the core of the story was that crime is up because unemployment is up, one is forced to assume that it is adult, rather than juvenile, crime which garnered this attention in the first place. We are now left with the startling reality that the posting of these Commandments in schools has created an effect in desperate search of a cause. I guess it's hard to be troubled by this stunning paradox when one is blissfully ignorant of its existence. To lay claim that moral character can be instilled in youth by the mere posting of doctrine already shown to be ineffective in their own community is an exercise in faulty logic, never mind a violation of the separation of church and state.

The irony of the whole thing is striking. This story has everything to do with economics, and nothing to do with religion, yet it is under this utterly irrational guise that citizens of this community demand the posting of their Ten Commandments in our public schools. Poverty and crime go hand in hand, and always will. To portray this issue as a religious one is misguided at best, and devious at worst. One could find this onslaught against the separation of church and state laughable, were it not so terribly tragic.