Texas lawmakers voted to mandate that government schools display a copy of the Ten Commandments for students, sparking praise from many Jews, Christians, and advocates of transcendent moral truth but howls of rage and threats of lawsuits from leftists, secularists, and pagans.
The bill, known as SB 10, was adopted by an overwhelming margin this week, with 82 in favor and 46 against. Democrats sought to add amendments forcing the including of texts from Islamic and pagan traditions, but those efforts fell short in the GOP-controlled legislature.
“Nothing is more deep-rooted in the fabric of our American tradition of education than the Ten Commandments,” explained Texas Representative Candy Noble (R-Lucas), who sponsored the legislation in the Texas House. “The very way we treat others in our society come from the principles found in the Ten Commandments.”
Rep. Noble also cited some of the moral principles enshrined in the decalogue and called for a restoration of those timeless principles. “In these days of courtroom mayhem, it’s time to return to the truths, to the fabric of our educational system,” she said. “Respect authority. Respect others. Don’t steal. Tell the truth. Don’t kill. Keep your word.”
On the Senate side, bill sponsor Texas Senator Phil King pointed out that the 10 Commandments were not just a religious mandate, but a critical part of U.S. history. “The Ten Commandments are part of our Texas and American story,” Senator King explained. And indeed, as the image of Moses on the U.S. Supreme Court attests to that truth.
Executive branch officials were enthusiastic about the legislation, too. Texas Governor Greg Abbott urged lawmakers to pass the bill and promised to sign the bill when it got to his desk. “Let’s get this bill to my desk,” he said before it was passed on May 25. “I’ll make it law.”
Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, an outspoken Christian, celebrated the move as well. “By placing the Ten Commandments in our public-school classrooms, we ensure our students receive the same foundational moral compass as our state and country’s forefathers,” he said, highlighting the divine commandments’ foundational role.
Democrats, by contrast, were furious over the legislation. Representative Vikki Goodwin, a far-left Democrat from Austin, argued that the commandments teaching children not to lie, steal, murder, commit adultery, covet, or worship idols was somehow “trampling over the freedom of religion.”
Meanwhile, State Representative Vincent Perez, an El Paso Democrat, claimed “posting religious texts without context doesn’t teach history.” Instead, he said, “it risks promoting one religion over others, something our Constitution forbids.”
Of course, neither the U.S. Constitution nor the Texas Constitution forbid the Ten Commandments. The commandments were not expelled from government schools until the 1980s. In reality, both constitutions were literally based on the Ten Commandments and the Bible.
As then-Harvard President Samuel Langdon explained to New Hampshire lawmakers in 1788 while encouraging them to ratify the U.S. Constitution, the document and the government it established are literally based on the Bible. This was common knowledge for centuries in America until a deliberate campaign to hide the truth.
Another leftist lawmakers, Texas Representative and former government school teacher James Talarico (D-Austin), acknowledged that there is indeed “a spiritual crisis in our world that must be addressed.” However, he said, “this bill is not the way to address it.” “The separation of church and state doesn’t just protect the state,” he said. “It also protects the church.”
It was not immediately clear how teaching children eternal moral truths from their Creator would threaten the church or the state. That language came from a letter by Thomas Jefferson to a Baptist association and was a promise that the federal government would not seek to interfere in their religious affairs, even though many states at that time had established churches.
Other opponents of the measure argued that government schools should not be teaching moral truths. Texas State Teachers Association spokesman Clay Robison, for instance, was quoted in media reports arguing that “public schools are not supposed to be Sunday school.”
Ironically, one of the close allies of John Dewey, widely regarded as the founding father of America’s government “education” system, understood that as well. Charles Potter, a co-signer of Dewey’s “Humanist Manifesto,” boasted in his book “Humanism, a New Religion:” “What can theistic Sunday School, meeting for an hour once a week, do to stem the tide of a five day program of humanistic teaching?”
The religious humanism outlined by Dewey, Potter, and others represents a dangerous false religion based on faith that there is no God. It is completely incompatible not just with Christianity, but with the “self-evident truths” enshrined in the Declaration of Independence regarding rights from the Creator — and therefore, with American values.
And yet, as Justice Potter Stewart explained in his famous dissent when the high court was expelling the Bible and prayer from government schools, this false religion has now been established. “Refusal to permit religious exercises thus is seen, not as the realization of state neutrality, but rather as the establishment of a religion of secularism,” he wrote.
A coalition of anti-Christian groups including the Communist Party-inspired ACLU, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and the Freedom From Religion Foundation already announced that they will be challenging the measure. The state, rather than local schools, will pay for the legal battle, according to an amendment to the bill.
Lawmakers know they are on solid ground. “For 200 years, the Ten Commandments were displayed in public buildings and classrooms across America,” noted sponsor Texas Senator King. “The Court has … provided a test that considers whether a governmental display of religious content comports with America’s history and tradition. It is time for Texas to … restore the history and tradition of the Ten Commandments in our state and our nation.”
The historic Texas legislation re-introducing God’s laws in school follows other states including Arkansas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and beyond that are bringing God, the Bible, and the Ten Commandments back into education. At least some of the challenges are expected to go to the U.S. Supreme, where advocates hope to finally reverse the disastrous 1980 ruling against the Decalogue.
In that case, far-left Justice William Brennan made an astounding argument. “Posting of religious texts on the wall serves no such educational function,” he said. “If the posted copies of the Ten Commandments are to have any effect at all, it will be to induce the schoolchildren to read, meditate upon, perhaps to venerate and obey, the Commandments.”
The law is set to go into force on September 1.
While restoring the Ten Commandments’ central role in education is a positive development for Texas, it does not remedy the systemic problems with government schools. In fact, the whole system is unbiblical and socialistic in nature. More and more scholars are now arguing that the system itself is unconstitutional, too.
It is time for lawmakers to think bigger! America’s future depends on getting this right.
