A panel of three federal appellate judges has ruled that a Louisiana law requiring the Ten Commandments to be posted in each of the state’s public school classrooms is unconstitutional.
The ruling on Friday marked a major win for civil liberties groups who say the mandate violates the separation of church and state, and that the poster-sized displays would isolate students — especially those who are not Christian.
“Parents and students challenge a statute requiring public schools to permanently display the Ten Commandments in every classroom in Louisiana,” the court said in its ruling. “The district court found the statute facially unconstitutional and preliminarily enjoined its enforcement. We AFFIRM.”
The mandate, which took effect Jan. 1, has been touted by Republicans, including President Trump, and marks one of the latest pushes by conservatives to incorporate religion into classrooms. Backers of the law argue the Ten Commandments belong in classrooms because they are historical and part of the foundation of U.S. law.
The ruling from the largely conservative 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals stems from a lawsuit filed last year by parents of Louisiana school children from various religious backgrounds, who said the law violates First Amendment language guaranteeing religious liberty and forbidding government establishment of religion.
“As noted, if H.B. 71 goes into effect, Students will be subjected to unwelcome displays of the Ten Commandments for the entirety of their public school education,” the judges wrote. “There is no opt-out option.”
Louisiana in June 2024 became the first state to require the Ten Commandments to be displayed in every public school classroom when Republican Gov. Jeff Landry signed the mandate into law. The law required a poster-sized display of the Ten Commandments in “large, easily readable font” in all public classrooms, from kindergarten to state-funded universities.
The court’s ruling backs an order issued last fall by U.S. District Judge John deGravelles, who declared the mandate unconstitutional and ordered state education officials not to take steps to enforce it and to notify all local school boards in the state of his decision.
Law experts have long said they expect the Louisiana case to make its way to the U.S. Supreme Court, testing the conservative court on the issue of religion and government.
In 1980, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a similar Kentucky law violated the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which says Congress can “make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” The high court found that the law had no secular purpose but served a plainly religious purpose.
In 2005, the Supreme Court held that such displays in a pair of Kentucky courthouses violated the Constitution. At the same time, the court upheld a Ten Commandments marker on the grounds of the Texas state Capitol in Austin.
