Supreme Court asked to review Texas's Ten Commandments requirement for schools

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) asked the Supreme Court on Monday to hear its challenge to Texas's law requiring public school classrooms to post the Ten Commandments.

Representing a group of parents from various faiths, the civil liberties organization says the law violates the First Amendment's religious protections.

"As a rabbi and parent, forcing a Christian version of the Ten Commandments on children in every classroom is particularly upsetting," said Joshua Fixler, a Jewish parent from Houston suing, in a statement.

The Supreme Court chooses what cases it hears and turns away the vast majority. The justices are likely to consider the ACLU's request at a closed-door conference after the court's next term begins this fall.

State lawmakers passed the law last year, requiring elementary and secondary school classrooms to post a conspicuous display of the Ten Commandments. The statute specifies the size and other requirements.

Texas is one of multiple Republican-led states that recently have passed laws requiring public school classrooms to post the Ten Commandments. A judge ruled a similar law in Arkansas is unconstitutional.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, however, agreed with Texas that its law could stand.

"In doing so, it not only decided these cases in a way that conflicts with this Court's precedents but also deepened confusion among the lower courts over how this Court's Establishment Clause jurisprudence applies," the ACLU wrote in its Supreme Court petition.

The petition has not yet been posted on the court's docket. The Hill received a copy from the ACLU, which says it was filed on Monday.

It brings another major clash concerning religious rights in public schools to the Supreme Court.

Last year, the Supreme Court's 6-3 conservative majority sided with a group of Montgomery County, Md., parents seeking to opt their children out from instruction that uses books with LGBTQ themes.

And in 2022, the majority sided with a high school football coach who was reprimanded for leading postgame prayers on the football field's 50-yard line.