Supporting the seal, to the right, are factories, and, to the left, are farms; both represent historical economic foundations of Lehigh County.

[1] On November 5, 2015, Freedom From Religion Foundation, a Madison, Wisconsin-based atheist advocacy organization, demanded that Lehigh County redesign the seal and the flag, citing a violation of their freedom of religion and First Amendment rights and previous court rulings the organization had received elsewhere, including court-ordered removal of a Ichthys on Republic, Missouri's seal and the removal of a cross on the seals of Zion, Illinois, La Mesa, California, and Edmond, Oklahoma.

"[4] In September 2017, Edward G. Smith, a federal judge with the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, ruled that the addition of a cross on the county's seal was unconstitutional and that the county needed to modify it.

[7][4] In his ruling, Smith stated that, while he did not believe the cross itself was unconstitutional, an earlier precedent in the 1971 case of Lemon v. Kurtzman mandated it.

[9][10][11] In August 2019, citing American Legion v. American Humanist Association, a ruling earlier that year, the appeals court determined that the presence of a cross in the county seal did not violate the constitution since it commemorated the history of Lehigh County.