(The Center Square) – One of the bills Gov. Greg Abbott has signed into law is already facing legal challenges.
Abbott signed SB 10 into law on June 22, which requires every public-school classroom in Texas to post a copy of the Ten Commandments beginning in the 2025-2026 school year.
Since then, five Protestant pastors, Islamic leaders and parents from north Texas school districts sued. They sued the Texas Education Agency, Dallas ISD, Desota ISD and Lancaster ISD in U.S. District Court Northern District of Texas.
They argue SB 10 violates the U.S. Constitution and the Texas Constitution and “no federal court has upheld any display of the Ten Commandments by a public school.”
“Permanently posting the Ten Commandments in every Texas public-school classroom unconstitutionally pressures students into religious observance, reverence, and adoption of the state’s mandated religious scripture,” violating the Establishment and Free Exercise clauses of the First Amendment, the lawsuit argues. SB 10 also “substantially interferes with the rights of parents to direct their children’s religious education and upbringing,” violating the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment, the lawsuit argues.
They also argue SB 10 violates the Texas Constitution, which states, “No man shall be compelled to attend, erect or support any place of worship, or to maintain any ministry against his consent. No human authority ought, in any case whatever, to control or interfere with the rights of conscience in matters of religion, and no preference shall ever be given by law to any religious society or mode of worship.”
They explain that SB 10 mandates a “religiously discriminatory” display that will substantially burden the religious exercise of parents who don’t agree or believe the “state-sanctioned version of the Ten Commandments by pressuring them to suppress or limit expression of their religious or nonreligious backgrounds, beliefs, or practices while in school to avoid the potential disfavor, reproach, and/or disapproval of school officials and/or their peers.”
They also argue it will substantially burden the religious exercise of students who don’t “subscribe to the state-sanctioned version of the Ten Commandments by pressuring them into observance, veneration, and adoption of the state’s favored religious scripture in violation of their own religious or non-religious beliefs,” among other concerns.
The lawsuit asks the court to declare SB 10 unconstitutional and enjoin the state, school boards and school districts from enforcing it.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, ACLU, Americans United for Separation of Church and State and Freedom From Religion Foundation also announced they will sue. Next Generation Action Network also announced it sued. More lawsuits and plaintiffs are expected to challenge the law.
SB 10 “is prohibited by longstanding Supreme Court precedent. Nearly 50 years ago, in Stone v. Graham, the Supreme Court ruled that the First Amendment forbids public schools from posting the Ten Commandments in classrooms,” the ACLU notes.
The ACLU notes that Texas communities are religiously diverse, aren’t religious or don’t include the Ten Commandments as part of their faith tradition. Because SB 10 requires text to be used that is only associated with some Protestant denominations, it doesn’t “reflect the beliefs of most Jewish and Catholic families” let alone Islamic, Buddhist or other faiths, it argues. As a result, SB 10 “will co-opt the faith of millions of Texans and marginalize students and families who do not subscribe to the state’s favored scripture. We will not allow Texas lawmakers to divide communities along religious lines and attempt to turn public schools into Sunday schools.”
The ACLU is also encouraging parents who oppose the law to contact it to join its lawsuit.
Abbott has argued the state will win its legal challenge because he won a Ten Commandment case when he was attorney general 20 years ago. That case had to do with a monument on the capitol grounds and had nothing to do with public school classrooms.
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The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals last week ruled against a similar Louisiana law.
Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry was the first governor to sign a bill into law requiring the Ten Commandments to be posted in public school classrooms. The law was immediately challenged and a district court ruled it was unconstitutional. The state appealed to the Fifth Circuit and a three-judge panel upheld the lower court’s ruling also stating it’s unconstitutional. Louisiana is appealing to have the full appellate court hear the case. In the meantime, the state’s law remains blocked from going into effect.