2005
On March 8, 2005 the San Diego City Council voted against a proposal to transfer the land to the National Park Service, a move which proponents believed might avoid the court-ordered removal of the cross. Opponents claimed this would merely shift the church-state issue to federal jurisdiction and would only delay the eventual removal of the cross. The City Council declined the offer of the Federal Government to accept the transfer of the Mt. Soledad Memorial property. (Council Motion Passes: 5 Yeas, 3 Nays, 1 Absent)
Opposition to the City Council's action resulted in a referendary petition, signed by over 100,000 County of San Diego residents, calling on the Council to reverse its decision against donating the property. On May 16, 2005, the Council reconsidered its decision to transfer the land at the request of those petitioners, and, after rejecting a proposal to directly donate the land to the Federal government in a 5–4 vote, the Council voted 6–3 to include a ballot measure in the upcoming special Mayoral election to be held July 26 which would allow the voters of San Diego ballot item (PDF) to approve the donation.
On July 26, 2005, the ballot measure to transfer the property to the Interior Department as a veterans memorial received votes exceeding the two-thirds threshold required to pass. Voters Pass Prop A: "Shall the City of San Diego donate to the federal government all of the City's rights, title, and interest in the Mt. Soledad Veterans Memorial property for the federal government's use of the property as a national memorial honoring veterans of the United States Armed Forces?" (Proposition A Passes: Yes votes totaled 197,125 or 75.96% and the No votes totaled 62,373 or 24.04%). However, the plaintiff in the federal court case filed a case in California Superior Court challenging the constitutionality of the proposition.
On September 3, Superior Court Judge Patricia Yim Cowett issued a temporary restraining order barring the transfer until the issue was settled. Lawyers on each side presented their arguments on October 3, 2005. A key issue was the status of the area as a secular war memorial, given the fact that it was not developed as a memorial until ten years after the first lawsuit. Prior to the lawsuit, no plaque or marker designated or explained the site's status as a war memorial, and during the fifty years prior to the law suit, there were no ceremonies or recognitions of the Korean War or to war veterans at the site, only Easter Sunday services. A 1985 map of the "San Diego Area" identifies the cross as the Mt. Soledad Easter Cross. A court document also refers to several references of the Easter Cross including, "...the U.S. Department of Commerce Coast and Geodetic Survey (indicating "Easter Cross" on chart)."
The plaintiff argued that the ballot measure was unconstitutional because it resulted in an unconstitutional act—transferring the property to the federal government for the purpose of keeping the cross in its present location on public parkland, a purely religious symbol of one faith. The City argued that the purpose of the ballot measure was to determine the will of the people of San Diego with respect to the federal government's offer to accept a donation of the property. The private citizens' group which had sponsored the petition leading to ballot measure argued that display of the cross was not unconstitutional because the many significant improvements added to it removed any doubt that it is a genuine veterans memorial.
On October 7, 2005, Judge Cowett found the ballot measure unconstitutional. Her ruling stated: "Maintenance of this Latin Cross as it is on the property in question, is found to be an unconstitutional preference of religion in violation of Article I, Section 4, of the California Constitution, and the transfer of the memorial with the cross as its centerpiece to the federal government to save the cross as it is, where it is, is an unconstitutional aid to religion in violation of Article XVI, Section 5, of the California Constitution."
Read more about this topic: Mount Soledad Cross Controversy