The Associated Press

PEEBLES, Ohio - Activists appealing a federal court's order to remove Ten Commandments monuments from public school grounds placed one of the granite tablets Friday at a mortgage loan office.

The tablets were removed June 9 from the grounds of four Adams County high schools after U.S. Magistrate Timothy Hogan of Cincinnati ruled that displaying them on public property was unconstitutional and a violation of the separation of church and state.

The school district is challenging that ruling. The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati has not scheduled a date to hear arguments in the appeal.

Supporters of the Ten Commandments tablets put one of the 800-pound, 3-foot-high monuments inside the lobby of the Adams County Building & Loan Co. office in Peebles, about 60 miles east of Cincinnati. Several dozen people gathered outside for a brief ceremony Friday.

"We're calling it a temporary relocation because if we win in the appeals court, of course, we're going to move the monuments back to the schools," said the Rev. Ken Johnson, pastor of Seaman United Methodist Church and spokesman for Adams County for the Ten Commandments, an activist group.

Placing the monument on private property is appropriate, said Scott Greenwood, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, which sued on behalf of a resident in 1999 to have the tablets removed.

The other monuments remain in storage until they can be placed on private property elsewhere in the county, Johnson said.