WOOD COUNTY (KYTX) -- A battle over God is playing out in an East Texas court room, and now Wood County commissioners are asking a district judge to throw out a law suit filed by a Hawkins man who says commissioners--and other politicians---are using Christianity for political gain.
Flipping through the verses of a well-worn copy of the King James bible, Charles Scott found scriptures Monday to back up his attack on courtroom Christianity.
"It's politically correct to drop the name of God if you're in office," Scott said.
He's not the person you'd expect to sue an East Texas commissioners court over an opening prayer in meetings and the words "In God We Trust" on the wall.
"To myself, I have to admit that I am aspiring to Christ," Scott said.
He said he's a Christian and his petition for suit filed with the Wood County district clerk claims the county's four commissioners and county judge are misrepresenting and disparaging God.
Scott said anyone who would swear--with the help of God--to uphold a constitution that separates church and state and then put God back at the center of it all by invoking him publicly is a fraud.
"[Politicians] want to draw in God for their political purposes but they do not say anything about how they are going to reciprocate."
Scott said he never wanted to get lawyers involved, instead hoping to talk about the perceived problem between himself and the commissioners court. But he said they were never willing to join him on the other side of the table, so he had to take it to the next level.
"The United States Supreme Court has made it very clear that the national motto and opening sessions of prayer are constitutional practices and so we're just asking the course to dismiss the case," Erin Leu, an attorney for Wood County, said.
Leu and other lawyers for the county filed a motion for summary judgment which basically asks the district judge overseeing the case to throw it out.
Pointing to meetings dating back to 1985, they'll go head to head with Scott as they argue whether "In God We Trust" and a quick prayer are categorized as religion or tradition.
The law says they're different.
"Either way the law is very clear that the national motto and opening sessions of prayer are both constitutional, " Leu said. "So it really does not change they way that we're approaching this case."
None of the Wood County commissioners responded to requests for comment.
A hearing on the motion for summary judgment is scheduled for October 16. The judge could choose to rule immediately or he could delay his decision.
