Salt Lake City sold Main Street between North Temple and South Temple to the LDS Church in 1999. The ACLU then sued over the free-speech restrictions the church imposed on plaza visitors. The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with the ACLU in 2002 and the plaza, located next to Temple Square, was temporarily open to protesters, preachers and pamphleteers.

In 2003, the city agreed to sell the easement to the church - eliminating free speech on the plaza - in exchange for land and millions of dollars to build a community center in the Glendale area. The ACLU sued again and the case is now before the 10th Circuit.

-

When the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the Ten Commandments displays in Kentucky this week, it may have paved the way for a ruling against Salt Lake City's sale of public access on the Main Street Plaza.

That's what the American Civil Liberties Union hopes.

Thursday, the ACLU urged the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to consider the high court's Kentucky decision when it rules on whether Salt Lake City was primarily motivated to protect The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when it sold the plaza easement. The church owns the plaza and surrounding property.

In a letter to the Denver-based 10th Circuit, the ACLU says the Kentucky ruling undercuts the city's and the church's case.

The city and church point to the secular reasons for the 2003 easement sale - the land and money the city received to build a community center on the west side. Federal Judge Dale Kimball agreed.

A majority of justices in the Kentucky case said secular reasons must be "genuine, not a sham, and not merely secondary to a religious objective."

In the plaza case, the ACLU maintains the real reason for the sale was to allow the LDS Church to create a private religious plaza where the church can restrict free speech and promote its own faith.

"A legitimate reason [the community center in exchange for the easement] does not remove the court's mandate to look at everything else that happened," Dani Eyer, executive director of the ACLU's Utah chapter, said Friday.

City and church attorneys declined to comment.

The U.S. Supreme Court said courts can explore the context of government transactions in endorsement-of-religion cases, noting "reasonable observers have reasonable memories."

Context is key to the ACLU's plaza case. The group quotes City Council members who called the plaza "sacred." And the ACLU points to how Mayor Rocky Anderson initially said it would be a "betrayal" to sell the easement and was then faced with a massive public-relations campaign by the LDS Church. Anderson brokered the easement sale, but said he wasn't bullied by the church.

"The history of this litigation - especially the mayor's actions prior to the relinquishment of the easement - has irreversibly tainted the later decision to accede to the church's demands," the ACLU wrote the 10th Circuit.