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As disputes rage on over religion\u2019s place in public schools, the Ten Commandments have become a focal point.\u00a0At least a dozen states<\/a>\u00a0have considered proposals that would require classrooms to post the biblical laws, and three passed laws mandating their display in 2024-2025:\u00a0Louisiana<\/a>,\u00a0Arkansas<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Texas<\/a>.<\/p>\n All three laws have been at least partially blocked \u2013\u00a0most recently Texas\u2019 law<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 after federal trial court rulings. But the ongoing cases seem aimed at overturning a 45-year-old U.S.\u00a0Supreme Court precedent<\/a>\u00a0prohibiting the posting of the Ten Commandments in public schools.<\/p>\n As\u00a0religion and education<\/a>\u00a0law researchers<\/a>, we believe this situation is especially noteworthy because of its timing. The Supreme Court has been using\u00a0a new standard<\/a>\u00a0to assess religious freedom cases \u2013 and its judgments on religion\u2019s role in public education are perhaps the most religion-friendly they have ever been.<\/p>\n Litigation over the Ten Commandments is not new. More than a dozen\u00a0early cases<\/a>\u00a0generally upheld<\/a>\u00a0laws and policies mandating their recitation in schools. These enactments survived because the Supreme Court did not\u00a0extend the First Amendment to the states<\/a>\u00a0until 1940.<\/p>\n However, the issue of posting the commandments in schools first surfaced in 1980. In a case called\u00a0Stone v. Graham<\/a>, the Supreme Court struck down a Kentucky statute requiring displays of the Ten Commandments in classrooms. The court reasoned that the law violated\u00a0the First Amendment\u2019s establishment clause<\/a>: \u201cCongress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.\u201d<\/p>\n At the time, the court used three criteria, known as the \u201cLemon test,\u201d to evaluate whether a government action violated the establishment clause. According to this test \u2013 which developed from\u00a0a 1971 Supreme Court decision<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 governmental actions must have a secular legislative purpose, and their main effect may neither advance nor inhibit religion. In addition, they must avoid excessive entanglement with religion.<\/p>\n When Kentucky\u2019s case came before the court, justices rejected its argument that the displays served a secular educational purpose. The majority did not think that a small notation on posters describing the Ten Commandments as the \u201cfundamental legal code<\/a>\u00a0of Western Civilization and the Common Law of the United States\u201d was sufficient, and wrote that the posters were \u201cplainly religious in nature.\u201d<\/p>\n Twenty-five years later, in 2005, disputes over public displays of the Ten Commandments reached the Supreme Court once more. This time, the displays were not in schools. But the first controversy arose, again, in Kentucky.<\/p>\n Officials in two counties had erected displays at courthouses that included the Ten Commandments, Magna Carta and the Declaration of Independence. The justices limited their order to one dispute, in\u00a0McCreary County<\/a>, invalidating the display for violating the establishment clause \u2013 largely because it lacked a secular legislative purpose.<\/p>\n On the same day, though, the Supreme Court reached the opposite result in another case,\u00a0Van Orden v. Perry<\/a>. The court permitted a display including the Ten Commandments to remain on the grounds of the Texas Capitol in Austin, where it was one of 17 monuments and 21 historical markers.<\/p>\n Unlike the fairly new displays in Kentucky, the long-standing one in Texas, with the first monument\u00a0erected in 1891<\/a>, was built using private funds. The court left the Ten Commandments monument in place because it was a more passive display. The Capitol grounds are spread out over 22 acres, meaning the display was not as readily apparent as if it had been posted in classrooms for children to see every day.<\/p>\n In 2024, a federal trial court in\u00a0Louisiana blocked a state law<\/a>\u00a0mandating that the Ten Commandments be posted in public schools. Undeterred, Arkansas and Texas passed similar legislation the following year.<\/p>\n Arkansas\u00a0Act 573<\/a>, signed into law in April 2025, obligated officials to display a \u201cdurable poster or framed copy<\/a>\u201d of the Ten Commandments in all state and local government buildings, including public school and college classrooms.<\/p>\n Republican Rep. Alyssa Brown, one of the Arkansas bill\u2019s sponsors, described it as an effort to educate students on how the United States was founded and how the founders framed the Constitution.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re not telling every student they have to believe in this God,\u201d\u00a0she told a legislative committee<\/a>, \u201cbut we are upholding what those historical documents mean and that historical national motto.\u201d<\/p>\n Texas, meanwhile, adopted\u00a0a similar law<\/a>\u00a0in June 2025.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is incumbent on all of us to follow God\u2019s law, and I think we would all be better off if we did,\u201d the bill\u2019s sponsor in the Texas House, Republican Rep. Candy Noble,\u00a0said during debate<\/a>.<\/p>\n Supporters of these laws have\u00a0claimed that they are constitutional<\/a>\u00a0because of an important shift at the Supreme Court. In 2022, the court adopted a new \u201chistory and tradition test<\/a>\u201d to assess religion in public places, including classrooms.<\/p>\n The \u201chistory and tradition test<\/a>\u201d originated in\u00a0Kennedy v. Bremerton School District<\/a>, a case about a public high school football coach who\u00a0prayed on the field<\/a>\u00a0at the end of games. The Supreme Court ruled in 2022 that school officials could not prevent him from doing so, because it was personal religious observance protected by the\u00a0First Amendment<\/a>\u2019s other religion clause: that the government shall not prohibit the \u201cfree exercise\u201d of religion.<\/p>\n Kennedy charted a new course on religion\u2019s place in public life. Acknowledging that it \u201clong ago abandoned Lemon and its endorsement test offshoot,\u201d the justices explained that \u201cthe Establishment Clause must be interpreted\u00a0by \u2018reference to historical practices and understandings<\/a>.\u2018\u201d It remains to be seen how this vague standard plays out in later cases.<\/p>\n Opponents\u00a0quickly challenged<\/a>\u00a0Arkansas\u2019 law. Seven families from various religious traditions filed suit, arguing that it was a direct violation of both the\u00a0establishment<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0free exercise clauses<\/a>\u00a0of the First Amendment.<\/p>\n On Aug. 4, a federal trial court judge\u00a0ruled in the families\u2019 favor<\/a>. The court found that the required display would have \u201cforced [students] to engage with\u201d the Ten Commandments, and \u201cperhaps to venerate and obey\u201d them. The trial court also applied the new\u00a0historical practices and understandings test<\/a>, holding that there was no evidence of a tradition to display the Ten Commandments in public schools permanently.<\/p>\n The court thus temporarily barred school boards from enforcing Act 573,\u00a0pending any further appeals<\/a>.<\/p>\n Two weeks later, a federal trial court in Texas\u00a0temporarily blocked<\/a>\u00a0the law on the ground that it\u00a0likely violated the First Amendment<\/a>, though the judge\u2019s order only\u00a0applies to 11 districts<\/a>.<\/p>\n Controversy over the Ten Commandments continues to raise larger questions over the role of religion in public education.<\/p>\n Supporters of such bills seemingly fail to recognize that they cannot\u00a0impose their religious values in the public sphere<\/a>. At the same time, some opponents \u2013 including Jewish, Christian, Unitarian Universalist, Hindu and nonreligious plaintiffs \u2013 do not necessarily wish to remove religion entirely from educational institutions.<\/p>\n These critics want to uphold the principle, as the Supreme Court announced, that the government must demonstrate \u201cneutrality between religion and religion<\/a>, and between religion and nonreligion.\u201d In other words, critics do not want one religion or religion generally to dominate.<\/p>\n Today\u2019s challenge is to find the balance in public life. We believe the courts and legislatures must avoid sending the message that religion has no place in a free and open society \u2013 just as they must not permit one set of values to dominate, as the bills in Arkansas and Texas seem to aspire to do.<\/p>\n How the courts and legislatures balance the rights of the majority and minority in these disputes over the place of the Ten Commandments in public life may go a long way toward shaping the future of religious freedom in American public education.<\/p>\nThe Ten Commandments and the courts<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\u2018Follow God\u2019s law\u2019<\/strong><\/h4>\n
Shift at SCOTUS<\/strong><\/h4>\n
Blocked \u2013 for now<\/strong><\/h4>\n
Religion\u2019s role<\/strong><\/h4>\n