The Supreme Court is set to rule on whether the city of Boston was right to stop a Christian Flag from flying over City Hall.
For years, the city rotates dozens of flags on a pole outside City Hall, some flags have celebrated Veterans, LGBTQ pride, paramedics and more, to promote diversity.
However in 2017 when an conservative activist Harold Shurtleff applied to hoist a “Christian flag” city officials wouldn’t let it fly.
City Hall originally stated: “The blue and white flag, with a red Latin cross in one corner, would violate the long-held principle of separation of church and state.”
The Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Tuesday in a case that has united unlikely parties, posing the question, "Is it religious discrimination if the city of Boston prevents a man from flying a “Christian” flag on a flagpole outside City Hall where other groups have displayed banners of their own?".
Mr Shurtleff began pursuing the case after authorities rejected his application to fly a flag that featured a red cross outside City Hall, even though it had approved 284 straight applications before his arrived.
President Joe Biden and the American Civil Liberties Union have gotten behind his case.
In an amicus friend of the court brief, the ACLU argued that by opening the flagpole to general use, it had created an open-access public forum where it couldn’t pick and choose certain viewpoints.