BY SRH
Texas politicians mandated that government schools display the Ten Commandments for students, eliciting plaudits from Jews, Christians, and moralists but wrath and litigation threats from leftists, secularists, and pagans.
SB 10 passed comfortably this week with 82 votes to 46. Democrats failed to pass amendments requiring Islamic and pagan texts in the GOP-controlled legislature.
“Nothing is more deep-rooted in the fabric of our American tradition of education than the Ten Commandments,” said Texas House sponsor Candy Noble (R-Lucas). “The Ten Commandments shape how we treat others in society.”
Rep. Noble also called for the restoration of Decalogue morality. “In these days of courtroom mayhem, it’s time to return to the truths, to our educational system,” she remarked. “Respect authority. Respect others. Don’t steal. Be honest. Avoid killing. Honor your word.”
In the Senate, measure sponsor Texas Senator Phil King said the 10 Commandments were not merely religious but important to U.S. history. “The Ten Commandments are part of our Texas and American story,” Senator King said. The U.S. Supreme Court’s Moses image proves it.
Executive branch officials liked the bill too. Texas Governor Greg Abbott urged lawmakers to pass the bill and pledged to sign it. “Let’s get this bill to my desk,” he declared before its May 25 passage. I’ll legislate.”
Outspoken Christian Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick also applauded the move. He noted that displaying the Ten Commandments in public schools gives pupils the same moral compass as our state and country’s forebears.
In contrast, Democrats raged over the bill. A far-left Austin Democrat, Representative Vikki Goodwin, claimed that teaching students not to lie, steal, murder, commit adultery, covet, or worship gods was “trampling over the freedom of religion.”
El Paso Democratic State Representative Vincent Perez said “posting religious texts without context doesn’t teach history.” Instead, “it risks promoting one religion over others, something our Constitution forbids.”
Nowhere in the U.S. or Texas Constitutions are the Ten Commandments forbidden. The commandments remained in government schools into the 1980s. Both constitutions were founded on the Bible and Ten Commandments.
In 1788, then-Harvard President Samuel Langdon told New Hampshire lawmakers that the Constitution and its governance are based on the Bible. American society knew this for generations until a purposeful lie.
Another socialist, Texas Representative and former government school instructor James Talarico (D-Austin), admitted “a spiritual crisis in our world that must be addressed.” He added, “this bill is not the way to address it.” “The separation of church and state doesn’t just protect the state,” he remarked. “It protects the church.”
How teaching children everlasting moral truths from their Creator will undermine the church or state was unclear. In a letter to a Baptist association, Thomas Jefferson promised that the federal government would not intervene in their religious concerns, even though many states possessed churches.
Other opponents said government schools shouldn’t teach morality. According to media sources, Texas State Teachers Association spokesman Clay Robison said “public schools are not supposed to be Sunday school.”
Ironically, one of John Dewey’s closest allies, the founder of America’s government “education” system, realized that. Charles Potter, a signer of Dewey’s “Humanist Manifesto,” exclaimed in “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 hazardous false religion of religious humanism defined by Dewey, Potter, and others is predicated on not believing in God. It contradicts Christianity, the Declaration of Independence’s “self-evident truths” about Creator rights, and American principles.
However, as Justice Potter Stewart noted in his famous dissent when the high court expelled the Bible and prayer from government schools, this counterfeit religion has been developed. He stated that refusing religious exercises establishes a secularism religion, not governmental neutrality.
Anti-Christian groups including the Communist Party-inspired ACLU, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and the Freedom From Religion Foundation have already decided to challenge the proposal. An change to the measure states that the state will pay for the legal battle, not local schools.
Lawmakers know they’re safe. “For 200 years, the Ten Commandments were displayed in public buildings and classrooms across America,” said Texas Senator King. The Court has established a criteria to determine if a government exhibition of religious content aligns with American history and culture. Texas should revive the Ten Commandments’ history and heritage in our state and nation.
Following Arkansas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and other states in reintroducing God, the Bible, and the Ten Commandments in schools, Texas passed a landmark statute. Advocates expect some cases to move to the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the 1980 Decalogue verdict.
That time, far-left Justice William Brennan made an amazing case. “Posting religious texts on the wall serves no educational function,” he stated. If the posted copies of the Ten Commandments have any effect, it will be to encourage schoolchildren to study, reflect, venerate, and obey them.
The law takes effect September 1.
Texas is better off restoring the Ten Commandments’ fundamental position in education, but it doesn’t fix government schools’ underlying issues. Overall, the system is unbiblical and socialist. Scholars increasingly argue that the system is unconstitutional.
Lawmakers must dream big! Getting this correctly will determine America’s destiny.
