A group of 18 multifaith and nonreligious Texas families filed a class action lawsuit Dec. 2 to stop displays of the Ten Commandments in all Texas public school districts not already subject to an injunction.
Already, two federal judges in Texas have ruled the state’s Senate Bill 10 is unconstitutional, but those injunctions apply only to two dozen districts involved in that specific litigation. Plaintiffs in the new lawsuit say with more than 1,000 school districts in Texas, a class action lawsuit is the most effective way to protect the religious freedom of all public school children and their families.
Ashby v. Schertz-Cibolo-Universal City Independent School District is the first class-action lawsuit and the third lawsuit challenging Senate Bill 10 filed by the Freedom From Religion Foundation, the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, the ACLU and Americans United for Separation of Church and State, with Simpson Thacher and Bartlett LLP serving as pro bono counsel. In all three cases, the organizations represent Texas families who don’t want their children to be forced to observe a state-mandated version of the Ten Commandments each school day.
Already, two federal judges in Texas have ruled the state’s Senate Bill 10 is unconstitutional.
The new class-action lawsuit seeks a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction that would stop any public school district not already involved in litigation from displaying the Ten Commandments.
The plaintiff families, which represent a range of faiths and nonreligious backgrounds, attend 16 school districts not named in the previous two cases. The school districts named as defendants include Argyle, Birdville, Carroll, Clear Creek, Deer Park, Fort Sam Houston, Hurst-Euless-Bedford, Katy, Liberty Hill, Magnolia, Medina Valley, Pearland, Prosper, Richardson, Schertz-Cibolo-Universal City, and Wylie ISDs. These districts span the Austin, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio metropolitan areas.
The organizations filed their first lawsuit, Rabbi Nathan v. Alamo Heights Independent School District, challenging SB-10 in July 2025 on behalf of 16 multifaith and nonreligious Texas families. U.S. District Judge Fred Biery issued a preliminary injunction in August preventing the 11 defendant school districts from displaying the Ten Commandments.
Despite the court’s ruling that the displays would be “plainly unconstitutional,” some Texas school districts that weren’t defendants in the Nathan case began to display or announced their intention to begin displaying Ten Commandments posters. In response, the organizations filed a second lawsuit, Cribbs Ringer v. Comal Independent School District, on behalf of a new group of 15 multi-faith and nonreligious Texas families who attend 14 of these districts. U.S. District Judge Orlando L. Garcia on Nov. 18 issued a preliminary injunction requiring those districts to remove the displays by Dec. 1 and prohibiting them from posting new displays.
Throughout this ongoing litigation, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has issued statements instructing school districts to comply with SB-10 unless a court has ordered them not to do so, and Paxton has sued three school districts to enforce the law.
The defendants in the Nathan case have appealed that decision and the full U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has agreed to hear the case on Jan. 20, 2026. The court injunctions blocking the schools from displaying the Ten Commandments remain in place while the appeal is pending.
“Politicians in Texas should know by now that public schools aren’t Sunday schools,” said Daniel Mach, director of the ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief. “Religious liberty belongs to all public school students and families, not just those who embrace some government officials’ preferred Scripture.”
“The courts are clear that forcing displays of the Ten Commandments on Texas students is unconstitutional,” said Chloe Kempf, attorney at the ACLU of Texas. “Yet Texas school districts won’t stop. Enough is enough. With this class action lawsuit, Texans are coming together to say: Students and families — not the government — should decide how or whether they practice their faith.”
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