by Misty Severi
The American Civil Liberties Union asked the Supreme Court on Monday to hear its challenge to Texas’ law requiring public schools to display the Ten Commandments in their classrooms.
The request comes after a federal appeals court upheld the state law in April, which passed the Republican-led state legislature last year and requires elementary and secondary school classrooms to post a display of the Ten Commandments.
The ACLU, which is representing a group of interfaith parents, claimed to the Supreme Court that the appeals court’s decision “decided these cases in a way that conflicts with this Court’s precedents but also deepened confusion among the lower courts over how this Court’s Establishment Clause jurisprudence applies.”
Rabbi Joshua Fixler, a plaintiff in the case, said, “Forcing a Christian version of the Ten Commandments on children in every classroom is particularly upsetting.”
“I am not only worried about my own kids, but I’m deeply concerned about all the children in my congregation. These displays put children in the position of having to defend themselves and their families’ religious beliefs against a government mandate that makes them feel different and separate from their classmates,” he added.
Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, said, “It is not the government’s role to daily expose young children to a coercive display of one religion’s set of religious edicts in our public schools. Our public schools exist to educate, not to proselytize.”
The Supreme Court chooses what cases it hears but turns away the vast majority. The justices will likely consider the ACLU’s request at a closed-door conference after the court’s next term begins in October.
The appeal also comes after an Arkansas judge ruled a similar state law in his state was unconstitutional in March.
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Misty Severi is a reporter for Just the News. Zachery Schmidt is the digital editor of The Star News Network and contributed to this story.
