In the latest wave of legislation signed by Texas Governor Greg Abbott, public school classrooms across the state are now mandated to showcase the Ten Commandments, as reported by FOX 7 Austin. The new law, Senate Bill 10, passed with strong support in the Republican-dominated Senate and stipulates that the framed documents must be sufficiently large and legible from anywhere in the classroom. Critics are primed for a challenge, citing concerns about the separation of church and state.
While Governor Abbott boasts a track record of defending religious symbols on state property, most famously at the Texas Capitol as the attorney general, the new directive plows deeper into contentious territory, by, funneling the Christian commandments into the daily view of Texas' nearly 6 million public school students. Meanwhile, as Houston Public Media has highlighted, despite the state's diverse religious demographics, the ordered posters will display an English version of the commandments that may not reflect the beliefs or backgrounds of all students.
The law's future may be shadowed by recent events in neighboring Louisiana, where an "identical bill" was struck down by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals on grounds of unconstitutionality, a decision Louisiana's Attorney General Liz Murrell has resolved to challenge up to the Supreme Court if necessary. In Texas, opponents of the bill, which garnered some resistance before its passage over proposed amendments allowing for a more inclusive representation of religious and ethical codes, are gearing up for an almost inevitable legal showdown.
Gov. Abbott's legislative signing spree didn't stop with the Ten Commandments; he put his signature on a total of 334 bills on Saturday. These range from enhancing rural health care access, instituting a financial literacy course requirement for high schoolers, to setting up grants for rural ambulance services, and creating a Grid Security Commission to safeguard the reliability of Texas' power infrastructure. Texas' bold legislative marathon continues to draw both praise and consternation, a, reflection of the political and cultural crossroads at which the state stands.
