Kennedy Center renaming could be challenged due to congressional authority

“What’s in a name? What we call a rose, by any other name, would smell just as good.” This question, posed by Juliet in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, now seems to occupy much of Washington. At a Christmas party with many Washington media outlets, I was asked the question more succinctly and repeatedly: “Can they do this?” the renaming of the Kennedy Center like the Trump-Kennedy Center. Soon, the courts may have to face this typically Shakespearean question, “for never has history been so unfortunate.”

Around Christmas, Ohio Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty, an ex-officio board member, announced her lawsuit over the name change.

As a first question, I will address the legal rather than political basis of the change. Many of us were angered by the renaming of the center, which was a memorial to an assassinated president. However, what people want to know is whether the change can be challenged. The answer is yes, but its outcome will not necessarily be easy or certain.

The center was originally built as the National Cultural Center by a 1958 law. It was renamed the John F. Kennedy Center by an act of Congress in 1964 as a living memorial.

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The key question is how this designation was made. This was contained in a law passed by Congress. Entitled John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, 20 USC 3, states that “no additional memorials or plaques of a commemorative nature shall be designated or installed in public areas of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.”

There are exceptions in sections 2 and 3 of the provision:

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“(2) Paragraph (1) of this subsection does not apply to:

(A) any plaque recognizing a donation from a foreign country;

(B) any plaque on a theater chair or theater box recognizing the donation of that chair or box; And

(C) any inscription on the marble walls of the north or south galleries, the Hall of States or the Hall of Nations recognizing a major contribution; …

(3) For purposes of this paragraph, testimonials and benefit performances shall not be construed as memorials.

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The language supports Congress’s intent to protect the memorial from any change or dilution. The specificity of the plaque exceptions for donors suggests that other major changes, such as a name change, are prohibited by federal law. Additionally, the center is appointed by an act of Congress. It is difficult to find any board authority that would override or delegate this power.

It is legitimate to question whether a name change constitutes an “additional memorial or plaque,” ​​but it would appear to be the case. If a simple plaque addressed to donors were to be specifically exempted, giant letters dedicating the center to an additional person would seem to fit Congress’s intent.

Still, the Trump administration could cite Servant Sampson from “Romeo and Juliet” and tell a court to “take it any way you want,” but the law doesn’t specifically say the name changes are a memorial.

Challengers could argue that, depending on the board’s interpretation, any memorial established by Congress, from the Lincoln Memorial to the Kennedy Presidential Library, could be renamed or cut.

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If a court recognizes that the law reflects a clear congressional intent to prohibit any alteration of the memorial, the question is how it can be challenged.

In any legal challenge, the advantage would likely go to the challengers if they can satisfy the standing requirements.

Kerry Kennedy, daughter of Robert F. Kennedy and sister of the Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr.announced: “In three years and a month, I’m going to take a pickaxe and remove these letters from this building, but I’m going to need help holding the ladder. Are you up for it? I’m applying for my carpenter’s card today, so it’ll be a union job!!!”

I would not recommend this approach. Most lawyers strive to keep their clients from falling from great heights.

The question is who has standing to challenge the change. Are members of the Kennedy family being harmed in any concrete way to satisfy their status? The associational position of historic preservation groups can be tricky. However, some may soon test these waters.

The most obvious way to resolve this problem is for Congress to be heard. It can either ratify the decision of the board of directors or expressly declare the change invalid and specify that the term “additional memorandum” includes any change of name. Either resolution could prove difficult with a sharply divided Congress. Soon a judge might join Romeo in his lament: “Oh, teach me how I should forget to think!”

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In any legal challenge, the advantage would likely go to the challengers if they can satisfy the standing requirements. Otherwise, the name could remain by default…or until another administration decides to make another change to the center formerly known as the Kennedy Center.

Of course, today Juliet could solve the naming problem the same way with a hyphenated marital name of Juliet Capulet-Montague, although that clearly would have been as bad as the Trump-Kennedy name. It clearly doesn’t smell as good to many.

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I expect judicial and congressional action to follow. Absent a quick resolution from Congress (which seems unlikely), this could lead to years of litigation.

However, both camps might do well to heed Shakespeare’s warning in another play that “when two raging fires meet, they consume the thing that feeds their fury.”

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