The main provision of the 2005 bill reads as follows: Notwithstanding any other provision of this chapter [ie Chapter 81 of title 28, United States Code], the Supreme Court shall not have jurisdiction to review, by appeal, writ of certiorari, or otherwise, any matter to the extent that relief is sought against an entity of Federal, State, or local government, or against an officer or agent of Federal, State, or local government (whether or not acting in official or personal capacity), concerning that entity's, officer's, or agent's acknowledgment of God as the sovereign source of law, liberty, or government.

This looks very narrow, much narrower than any right-thinking theocrat would be likely to want. It seems to say that you cannot seek relief where your complaint is that the entity etc is acknowledging God. But your complaint is much more likely to be that your free speech is being limited, equal rights denied or whatever other constitutional right is at stake. The closest you could get to complaining that the entity was acknowledging God would be a complaint that the entity was making a law respecting an establishment of religion. But if that is where the bill would bite, then by excluding court jurisdiction over that part of the first amendment it would be neutering part of the constitution. I hope that there is some presumption against an act passed by simple majorities effectively amending a constitution that is only supposed to be amended by two-thirds majorities and three-fourths of the states.

Indeed it is an interesting question whether the bill, if passed, would itself by struck down as unconstitutional because it amounted to a law respecting an establishment of religion.

The 2004 version looks much broader. It excluded jurisdiction where you sought relief by reason of the officer etc's acknowledgment of God. The 2004 version may have been defectively drafted. I would not seek relief against an officer by reason of that officer's acknowledgement of God. I would seek relief by reason of that officer's having limited my free speech, denied my equal rights or whatever else had been done. What the officer thought about God would not come into my reason. The reason for the officer having done something that led me to seek relief might be the officer's acknowledgement of God, but if I bring a case by reason of something, that thing is primarily the reason that I have, not the reason for my having a reason. If the 2004 version got enacted, lawyers could have a fine time litigating what it meant.

So perhaps the theocrats know not what they do. But that may not be sufficient reason to forgive them.

One reservation is that there is material from supporters of the bill arguing that it would in fact only apply to trivia. See:

www.cwfa.org/articledisplay.asp?id=5882&department=CWA&categoryid=misc

If the supporters really thought that, they would not be putting much effort into the bill. So could this innocuous-looking bill in fact be able to do far more than at first appears?

For a truly scary view of the bill, see:

www.yuricareport.com/Dominionism/ConstitutionRestorationAct.htm

There is a wider dimension. Walter Ullmann (1910-1983) analysed medieval political theories as embodying an ascending or a descending theory of power. In the former, the power of government ascends from the people. In the latter, it descends from God to the government and the people have to put up with it. The United States comes as close as anywhere to a purely ascending system - the people deliberately and at a known time chose to set up a limited government. (The picture is complicated slightly by the idea that the rights of people, allowing them to do all that, descend from the Creator.) On that basis, an official can acknowledge God as the sovereign source of liberty, but an official who acknowledges God as the sovereign source of law or government in the United States is applying a descending theory of power and is therefore making a profound mistake about the nature of the United States. Maybe that is the hidden agenda, not to put copies of the Ten Commandments in a few courthouses but to overturn the basic principle of ascending power on which the United States Constitution is built - a principle that goes far wider and deeper than the probibition on making a law respecting an establishment of religion.