Louisiana is free to implement its previously blocked law requiring Ten Commandments displays in public school classrooms, a federal appeals court ruled Feb. 20.
The full U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans overturned a three-member panel of its own judges and a district judge who blocked the 2024 law for being “plainly unconstitutional.”
The full appellate court ruled 12-6 that it was too soon to determine the constitutional harm the law would cause because it has not gone into effect.
“An unripe challenge does not become ripe merely because a party asserts that the challenged action would be unlawful on any conceivable set of facts. The Supreme Court has squarely rejected that approach,” the latest ruling says.
The ruling does not declare the Louisiana law to be constitutional.
However, the ruling does not declare the Louisiana law to be constitutional and acknowledges that “nothing in today’s narrow holding prevents future as-applied challenges once the statute is implemented and a concrete factual record exists.”
The ruling clears the way for the installation of 11-by-14-inch posters or displays of the Decalogue in all public K-12, college and university classrooms in Louisiana as litigation continues in Rev. Roake v. Brumley, the 2024 federal lawsuit that led to the appellate action.
Plaintiffs in the case are nine multi-faith and nonreligious families with children in public schools. They are represented by Americans United for Separation of Church and State, the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Louisiana, the Freedom from Religion Foundation and pro bono representation from Simpson Thacher and Bartlett.
“Today’s ruling is extremely disappointing and would unnecessarily force Louisiana’s public school families into a game of constitutional whack-a-mole in every school district,” the organizations said in a statement. “Longstanding judicial precedent makes clear that our clients need not submit to the very harms they are seeking to prevent before taking legal action to protect their rights.”
Paul Raushenbush
Interfaith Alliance declared the ruling clears the way for the “establishment of state religion. Its president, Paul Raushenbush, said this is “a gut punch” to Americans who believe in religious freedom.
“Right-wing Louisiana lawmakers and Fifth Circuit Court judges should crack open the Constitution.” he said. “It leaves no room for religious indoctrination or coercion in public schools. Our founders believed students should be free to learn without government-imposed religion.”
The groups emphasized the decision has no bearing on Rabbi Nathan v. Alamo Heights Independent School District, a case they are litigating against a Texas law mandating Ten Commandments displays in public schools. That case is awaiting a decision by the full U.S. Fifth District Court of Appeals.
Arkansas’ Ten Commandments law also remains blocked after a judge’s ruling in August. And a similar measure is winding its way through the legislature in Alabama.
SCOTUSblog observed last year that the plaintiffs in all three cases relied in part on Stone v. Graham, an 1980 Supreme Court ruling that a Kentucky Ten Commandments law violated the First Amendment because it was clearly religious in nature.
But the states wanting to post the Commandments are resting their hopes in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, a 2022 case in which the Supreme Court ruled a football coach’s on-field prayer sessions did not violate the Establishment clause and directed lower-court judges to consider the historical context of laws involving religion and government institutions.
“In the 45 years since that (Stone) decision was released, the content of the Ten Commandments (obviously) hasn’t changed, but the Supreme Court’s approach to the establishment clause has,” the SCOTUSblog noted.