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WESTERNPORT — The president of a local historical group has asked the Allegany County Board of Commissioners to reverse its decision to allow a monument to the U.S. Constitution on public property.

Edward W. Taylor Jr., of the Cumberland Historic Cemetery Organization, said Wednesday during a public meeting that the monument’s “editorialized” inscription and engraving that will recognize the donor, Citizens for a Secular Government, is “very inappropriate.”

In September, the commissioners approved an inscription for the monument and its location on the lawn of the Allegany County Circuit Courthouse on Washington Street. The monument would join a statue of George Washington and a monument of the Ten Commandments. Taylor said his group originally was supportive of the effort but backpedaled when Dr. Jeffrey Davis, the catalyst behind the Constitution monument, modified the inscription.

“Some of the editorialized paragraphing I do agree with,” Taylor said, “but that’s what it is — it’s an editorialized monument. We see no reason why his editorialized version of the Constitution needs to be on public property.”

At issue is the word “secular,” which a commissioner-appointed Constitution Monument Committee eliminated from the proposed inscription. But Taylor said the word still was set to be engraved in granite because the commissioners were allowing the sponsoring group’s name, Citizens for a Secular Government, to be included on the monument.

Taylor said his group’s board members “have a great issue” with the word, which is defined by The Random House College Dictionary as “not pertaining to or connected with religion.”

The word also means “atheist,” Taylor said. That word is defined as “a person who denies or disbelieves the existence of God or gods.”

Taylor told the commissioners the United States was founded on Judeo-Christian principles, as evidenced by not only the Constitution but also by the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence.

“In our opinion, if Dr. Davis would like to build this, this is a free country,” Taylor said, but “let him put it on private property.”

All of Taylor’s organization’s 804 monuments are placed on private property, he said.

County Attorney Bill Rudd noted that Davis himself objected to the committee’s approved inscription.

“I think most people would agree ... it’s pretty well apple pie and mom, frankly, as far as the Constitution,” Rudd said.

Rudd said that only the size, location and inscription for the monument were approved but that nothing else, including any recognition of the donating group, was “set in stone.”

The monument still needs to be approved by the Maryland Historic Trust. That request for approval has been made by the county, said Barry Levine, assistant county attorney.

Davis spearheaded the effort to have the Ten Commandments monument removed from the courthouse lawn in 2004. The commissioners authorized the monument’s relocation to the courthouse lawn about three days afterward, however, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on a similar case in Texas. Davis has said all along his preference would be to have the Ten Commandments monument removed.

Contact Kevin Spradlin at kspradlin@times-news.com.