A federal judge delivered a blow to a bill signed by Gov. Jeff Landry (R-LA), which sought to place the Ten Commandments in public classrooms across Louisiana.
U.S. District Judge John DeGravelles issued a preliminary injunction Tuesday to temporarily block Louisiana from implementing a law mandating all classrooms, from kindergarten to state-funded universities, to display the biblical text starting in 2025.
“[T]he question is not whether the Biblical laws can ever be put on a poster; the issue is whether, as a matter of law, there is any constitutional way to display the Ten Commandments in accordance with the minimum requirements of the Act,” DeGravelles wrote in a 177-page opinion. “In short, the Court finds that there is not.”
Louisiana became the first state in the nation to require the exhibition of the Ten Commandments in classrooms in June. The court’s move to block the measure comes after an American Civil Liberties Union-backed lawsuit said the law violated the separation of church and state and “is blatantly unconstitutional.”
“Religious freedom — the right to choose one’s faith without pressure — is essential to American democracy,” Alanah Odoms, Executive Director of the ACLU of Louisiana, said in a press release responding to the decision. “Today’s ruling ensures that the schools our plaintiff’s children attend will stay focused on learning, without promoting a state-preferred version of Christianity.”
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Republican Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill will likely appeal the court’s decision. She and other advocates of the law have argued that the Ten Commandments are “foundational documents of our state and national government” and said the biblical texts were displayed with a “context statement” describing how they “were a prominent part of American public education for almost three centuries.”
As @LAGovJeffLandry stated: H.B. 71 passed overwhelmingly through the state legislature and had bipartisan support. This Ten Commandments law is the will of the people of Louisiana! #lalege #lagov pic.twitter.com/yxgbBI5aR8
— Attorney General Liz Murrill (@AGLizMurrill) August 5, 2024
Landry has also maintained that the law was passed by “sheer bipartisan support” and “by the will of the people,” pointing to wide support for the bill in the state legislature. Louisiana lawmakers in the state House approved the bill by a 79-16 vote.
This article was originally published at www.washingtonexaminer.com
