A bill claiming the Bible’s Ten Commandments are “foundational documents of our state and national government” was signed into law Wednesday by Louisiana Republican Governor Jeff Landry. The new law requires a poster of the Ten Commandments, in a “large, easily readable font,” be displayed in all public school classrooms, from kindergarten through college.
“I can’t wait to be sued,” Gov. Landry bragged on Saturday at a GOP fundraising event in Tennessee after announcing he would sign the bill into law. Critics say it is unconstitutional.
A vice president for the civil rights group Americans United for Separation of Church and State is vowing to oblige Governor Landry.
“The 10 Commandment[s] recognize slavery twice in the text. On Juneteenth, LA Gov. Landry signed a law forcing every LA public school to display the 10 Commandments. AU [American United] is gonna sue! That’s right @americansunited, @FFRF, & @ACLU will see Gov. Landry in court,” AU’s Andrew Seidel said on social media, invoking the Freedom From Religion Foundation and the American Civil Liberties Union.
Louisiana is the first state in the nation to require the bible’s laws to be posted.
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“Proponents say the purpose of the measure is not solely religious, but that it has historical significance,” the Associated Press reports. “The displays, which will be paired with a four-paragraph ‘context statement’ describing how the Ten Commandments ‘were a prominent part of American public education for almost three centuries,’ must be in place in classrooms by the start of 2025.”
As the Louisiana Attorney General, Landry signed onto a letter opposing Critical Race Theory.
“More than two dozen Republican attorneys general are voicing their disapproval over the Department of Education’s proposed priorities for teaching K-12 students about American history and civics education because they would include references to systemic racism and how the history of slavery has shaped the U.S.” the Louisiana Illuminator reported in 2021.
“The state attorneys general argue in a May 19 letter to Education Secretary Miguel Cardona that public schools should not be given grant funds to teach about critical race theory, ‘including any projects that characterize the United States as irredeemably racist or founded on principles of racism (as opposed to principles of equality) or that purport to ascribe character traits, values, privileges, status, or beliefs, or that assign fault, blame, or bias, to a particular race or to an individual because of his or her race.’ ”
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Last year Republicans in the Texas Senate passed similar legislation to the bill Gov. laundry signed, leading the Texas Lt. Governor to brag prayer was returning to public schools. The House did not vote on the bill during the session, and it failed.
Louisiana newspaper The Advocate reports, “State Rep. Dodie Horton, R-Haughton, sponsored the legislation. She argued the law is constitutional, pointing to a 2022 U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld a public school football coach’s right to pray on the field.”
Critics have said that decision is flawed and based on false claims.
“She added that her bill is not meant to indoctrinate children, but to give them ‘guidelines,’ ” The Advocate added.
“’It doesn’t preach a certain religion, but it does teach a standard,’ she said, adding that the Ten Commandments offer a moral code that God ‘holds us accountable to live by.’
Mississippi Free Press news editor Ashton Pittman, responding to a report on Louisiana’s new Ten Commandments law remarked, “Christian nationalist theocrats doing what they do when they have power. No respect for people of other faiths.”
