In an attempt to show support for law enforcement agencies, a sign maker in Texas has offered religious auto decals with the national motto “In God We Trust” to individual police officials and entire police departments across the nation.
“To any law enforcement or first responders that want the ‘In God We Trust’ decals, we will donate them!” Brian Whitfield of Signs & More of New Boston, Texas posted to Facebook last month.
Whitfield said after receiving numerous requests for the religious decals, he decided to offer them, free of cost, to law enforcement bodies across America.
“We’re getting hundreds of messages about whether we will donate decals just for Bowie County,” Whitfield said. “Now, we will donate to any department that wants them until we can’t financially do it anymore. But yes, we will do it for any department!”
Whitfield also shared photographs of some police officials, including Deputy Russell Crawford of Bowie County Sheriff’s Office and Sheriff James Prince of New Boston, who have already started using the religious decals on their respective vehicles. He confirmed that more than 25 agencies across the country had requested him to provide them with the religious decals so far.
“You know, with law enforcement, they do a dangerous job, and I think it was an opportunity for them and for us to proclaim their trust is in God in each day they go out and do what they do,” he told the media.
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On the other hand, Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) has been contacting police departments and sheriff’s offices to ask them to get rid of the religious decals from their vehicles, while reiterating that the display of such phrases on government-owned property is unconstitutional. So far, Randolph County Sheriff’s Office in Missouri, Marion County Sheriff’s Office in Florida, Boaz Police Department in Alabama and Elizabethton Police Department in Tennessee are among some that have been contacted by the FFRF.
“It is inappropriate for the office to display ‘In God We Trust’ on government property. Statements about a God have no place on government-owned cars,” the letter from the FFRF reads. “[C]itizens should not be made to feel offended, excluded and like political outsiders because the local government they support with their taxes oversteps its power by prominently placing a religious statement on office vehicles.”
The FFRF also suggested that a more appropriate decal would carry the phrase “In God Some of Us Trust” since some agencies may in fact have officers who do not believe in God.
However, not all agencies are agreeable to removing the religious decals, despite them risking a potential lawsuit from the FFRF.
“If the Freedom from Religion Foundation wishes us to take them off our vehicles, I suggest that they get a judge’s order or a new sheriff,” responded Walton County, Florida Sheriff Michael Adkison. “You are obviously unaware that ‘In God We trust’ is the state motto of the state of Florida, and has been since 1886. This was reaffirmed in 2006.”
Whitfield is also giving out to private citizens a religious decal that reads “We Still Trust in God,” for a small fee.
Photo Credits: Fox News
