A federal judge has ordered 14 Texas school districts to remove Ten Commandments displays from classrooms by Dec. 1 and barred them from posting any new copies pending the outcome of litigation.
The Nov. 18 preliminary injunction stems from a lawsuit filed Sept. 22 against the Arlington, Azle, Comal, Conroe, Flour Bluff, Fort Worth, Frisco, Georgetown, Lovejoy, Mansfield, McAllen, McKinney, Northwest and Rockwall independent school districts.
“Defendants have erected the challenged displays in classrooms across their districts or, at the very minimum, plan to do so soon,” District Judge Orlando Garcia in San Antonio said in his order.
At issue is Senate Bill 10, a new state law requiring the display of 16-by-20-inch posters or framed copies of the Ten Commandments in all public classrooms in Texas.
The statute was first challenged in Rabbi Nathan v. Alamo Heights Independent School District, a lawsuit filed in July to stop the Alamo Heights, Austin, Cypress Fairbanks, Dripping Springs, Fort Bend, Houston, Lackland, Lake Travis, Plano, North East and Northside independent school districts from erecting the displays.
In August, District Judge Fred Biery in San Antonio declared the law to be “plainly unconstitutional” and barred decalogue displays pending the outcome of litigation in that case.
Ken Paxton
But after appealing the order, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton directed school districts not identified in Rabbi Nathan v. Alamo Heights and in Biery’s injunction to comply with the law.
“From the beginning, the Ten Commandments have been irrevocably intertwined with America’s legal, moral and historical heritage,” Paxton said. “Schools not enjoined by ongoing litigation must abide by SB-10 and display the Ten Commandments.”
Seeing their districts moving to follow Paxton’s direction, 15 nonreligious and multifaith families filed Cribbs Ringer v. Comal Independent School District in federal court. The action pointed not only to Biery’s injunction but also to a June federal appeals court decision that Louisiana’s Ten Commandments law is “facially unconstitutional” and harmful to students and families.
“Despite these precedents, the defendant school districts have pressed forward with actually posting SB-10 displays in classrooms or have confirmed they will do so shortly — even after receiving a letter from plaintiffs’ counsel in Nathan notifying them of the Nathan court’s ruling and warning that all school districts have an independent legal obligation to comply with the ruling and avoid violating children’s and parents’ First Amendment rights,” that suit says.
Garcia concurred, adding that “displaying the Ten Commandments on the wall of a public-school classroom as set forth in SB-10 violates the Establishment Clause.”
He added it is “impractical, if not impossible, to prevent plaintiffs from being subjected to unwelcome religious displays without enjoining defendants from enforcing SB-10 across their districts.”
Both lawsuits are led by the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Texas, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, the Freedom from Religion Foundation and Simpson Thacher and Bartlett LLP.
“Once again, a federal court has recognized that the Constitution bars public schools from forcing religious Scripture on students,” said Daniel Mach, director of the ACLU program on Freedom of Religion and Belief. “This decision is a victory for religious liberty and a reminder that government officials shouldn’t play favorites with faith.”
Americans United President Rachel Laser urged all Texas school districts to refrain from posting the Ten Commandments, even if they are not named in a lawsuit: “Families throughout Texas and across the country get to decide how and when their children engage with religion – not politicians or public-school officials.”
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