The US Court of Appeals admits the deployment of the Ten Commandments in Louisiana public schools

This past Friday, the US Court of Appeals gave the green light to the deployment of the Protestant version of the Ten Commandments in public schools in the state of Louisiana in what civil rights organizations and plaintiffs have criticized as an attack on religious freedom.

In its opinion, the court for the Fifth Circuit has approved by 12 votes in favor to six against the annulment of the moratorium declared by a lower court. The Court of Appeals considers, in general terms, that it is still too early to rule on the constitutionality of the order given by the governor of Louisiana, Jeff Landry, and defended by his attorney general, Liz Murrill.

“An immature remedy is not mature simply because a party asserts that the challenged action would be unlawful under any conceivable set of facts,” the judges wrote.

In a statement published on its website by the American Civil Liberties Association (ACLU), lawyers for a multi-religious group that opposed the deployment of the text regretted the decision.

“Today’s ruling is extremely disappointing and would unnecessarily force Louisiana public school families to participate in a constitutional game in all school districts,” they lamented. “But this fight is not over. We will continue to fight for religious freedom for Louisiana families.”

Those who have celebrated the decision have been Governor Landry and his prosecutor. “Common sense has returned,” the governor wrote on social media before congratulating Murrill, who in turn indicated that saying that “you will not kill or steal should be the subject of controversy.”

“My office has issued clear guidance to our public schools on how to comply with the law and we have created multiple examples of posters that demonstrate how it can be applied constitutionally. Louisiana public schools must comply with the law,” he added.

As for the rest of the country, the state of Arkansas has a similar law that has been challenged in federal court, and a law referring to the state of Texas also went into effect on September 1. In the latter case, some school districts are prohibited from posting the injunctions, again at the request of federal judges, but the reality is that they already appear in many classrooms in the state.