Civil liberties teams filed a lawsuit Monday to block Louisiana’s new law requiring the Ten Commandments to be displayed in each public college classroom — a measure they contend is unconstitutional.
Plaintiffs within the go well with embody mother and father of Louisiana public college kids, represented by attorneys with the American Civil Liberties Union, Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the Freedom From Religion Foundation.
Under the laws signed into law by Republican Gov. Jeff Landry final week, all public Ok-12 classrooms and state-funded universities can be required to display a poster-sized model of the Ten Commandments in “large, easily readable font” subsequent yr.
Opponents argue that the law is a violation of separation of church and state and that the display will isolate college students, particularly those that will not be Christian. Proponents say the measure will not be solely spiritual however that it has historic significance. In the language of the law, the Ten Commandments are “foundational documents of our state and national government.”
The lawsuit filed Monday seeks a court docket declaration that the brand new law, referred to within the lawsuit as HB 71, violates First Amendment clauses forbidding authorities institution of faith and guaranteeing spiritual liberty. It additionally seeks an order prohibiting the posting of the Ten Commandments in public college classrooms.
The ACLU said its complaint represented “parents who are rabbis, pastors, and reverends.”
“The state’s main interest in passing H.B. 71 was to impose religious beliefs on public-school children, regardless of the harm to students and families,” the lawsuit says. “The law’s primary sponsor and author, Representative Dodie Horton, proclaimed during debate over the bill that it ‘seeks to have a display of God’s law in the classroom for children to see what He says is right and what He says is wrong.'”
The law, the criticism alleges, “sends the harmful and religiously divisive message that students who do not subscribe to the Ten Commandments —or, more precisely, to the specific version of the Ten Commandments that H.B. 71 requires schools to display— do not belong in their own school community and should refrain from expressing any faith practices or beliefs that are not aligned with the state’s religious preferences.”
Defendants embody state Superintendent of Education Cade Brumley, members of the state training board and a few native college boards.
Michael Johnson / AP
Landry and Louisiana Attorney General Elizabeth Murrill help the brand new law, and Murrill has stated she is trying ahead to defending it. She issued an announcement saying she could not remark instantly on the lawsuit as a result of she had not but seen it.
“It seems the ACLU only selectively cares about the First Amendment —it doesn’t care when the Biden administration censors speech or arrests pro-life protesters, but apparently it will fight to prevent posters that discuss our own legal history,” Murrill stated within the emailed assertion.
The Ten Commandments have lengthy been on the middle of lawsuits throughout the nation.
In 1980, the U.S. Supreme Court dominated {that a} comparable Kentucky law violated the institution clause of the U.S. Constitution, which says Congress can “make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” The excessive court docket discovered that the law had no secular function however somewhat served a plainly spiritual function.
In a more moderen ruling, the Supreme Court held in 2005 that such shows in a pair of Kentucky courthouses violated the Constitution. At the identical time, the court docket upheld a Ten Commandments marker on the grounds of the Texas state Capitol in Austin. Those had been 5-4 choices, however the court docket’s make-up has modified, with a 6-3 conservative majority now.
Other states, together with Texas, Oklahoma and Utah, have tried to move necessities that the faculties display the Ten Commandments. However, with threats of authorized battles, none has the mandate in place apart from Louisiana.
The posters in Louisiana, which can be paired with a four-paragraph “context statement” describing how the Ten Commandments “were a prominent part of public education for almost three centuries,” should be in place in classrooms by the beginning of 2025. Under the law, state funds won’t be used to implement the mandate. The posters can be paid for via donations.
The case was allotted to U.S. District Judge John deGravelles, nominated to the federal bench by former President Barack Obama.