A South Carolina man says his constitutional rights have been violated after he was told by his local government to remove the Bible-themed signs he had posted on his property.
-- From "South Carolina Man Fights to Keep Religious Signs on His Property" By Diane Macedo, FoxNews.com 10/8/10
Oscar Moultrie says a Berkeley County, S.C., ordinance that requires residents to obtain government permission before putting up signs on their private property -- other than "for sale," "for rent," political signs, and a few other exceptions -- violates his First Amendment right to freedom of speech and freedom of religion.
Moultrie says he received no complaints about his signs before the county ordered him in March to remove them or pay $25 to get a permit to post them.
In his lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Charleston, S.C., he is asking the court to issue an immediate injunction that bars enforcement of the ordinance and declares it unconstitutional.
"The thing with the ordinance," says John Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute, which is representing Moultrie, "is it allows for political signs, which means that in this particular case it would be what you call viewpoint discrimination, which the Supreme Court and a number of federal courts have ruled on.
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