A federal judge nominated by former President Barack Obama struck down Arkansas's law requiring the Ten Commandments to be displayed in every public school classroom and library on Monday. Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders responded within hours, declaring she plans to appeal the ruling and "defend our state's values."
The decision lands in the middle of a three-state legal battle over classroom Ten Commandments displays in Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas, all of which have enacted similar mandates. While the Arkansas law is now blocked, the fight in Louisiana is moving in the opposite direction, and Texas litigation remains pending before the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
U.S. District Court Judge Timothy L. Brooks issued a written judgment blocking the 2025 Arkansas law. In his opinion, Brooks was blunt about his view of the mandate's constitutionality.
Nothing could possibly justify hanging the Ten Commandments — with or without historical context — in a calculus, chemistry, French, or woodworking class, to name a few.
Brooks went further, writing there was "no need to strain our minds to imagine a constitutional display mandated" by the 2025 law. "One doesn't exist," he wrote.
That reasoning deserves scrutiny. The Ten Commandments have historical significance that extends well beyond any single religious tradition. Legislatures in three states reached that conclusion. Brooks dismissed it in a sentence.
The scope of his ruling remains an open question, AP News reported. It is unclear whether the judgment applies only to the six Arkansas school districts named as defendants in the lawsuit or extends statewide. Seven Arkansas families of various religious and nonreligious backgrounds filed the challenge last year.
Megan Bailey, a spokesperson for the American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas, one of the groups representing the families who brought the lawsuit, told the AP the ruling "makes clear the law is unconstitutional."
Given that, it would be unwise for any school district in Arkansas to move forward with posting the Ten Commandments.
Bailey's warning to school districts went beyond what the court's ruling actually established. Whether the judgment binds districts beyond the six named defendants has not been publicly confirmed. The ACLU's framing as a blanket statewide prohibition is advocacy, not a legal conclusion the court has announced.
Across the state line, Louisiana is heading in the opposite direction. In 2024, Louisiana became the first state to mandate poster-sized displays of the Ten Commandments in every public school classroom, from kindergarten through college. Legal challenges followed and wound through federal courts for nearly two years.
Then came the Feb. 20 ruling from the full 5th U.S. Circuit of Appeals, which vacated an earlier court order that had prevented the law from taking effect. That cleared the way for displays to be installed. Gov. Jeff Landry wasted no time. In a letter to educators, Landry wrote that the court's decision "removes any obstacles to the implementation of Louisiana's Ten Commandments law."
Should now proceed with placing the posters in classrooms.
The Louisiana law requires schools to accept donated posters printed in "large, easily readable font." Earlier this year, the Louisiana Family Forum, a conservative advocacy group, sent posters to most of the state's parish school systems, the New Orleans Advocate/The Times-Picayune reported.
Implementation has been uneven so far. There have not yet been widespread reports of schools hanging the posters. Some school officials have expressed worries about potential litigation. Louisiana State University President Wade Rousse said the university intends to comply with the law but, as of last week, had not received donated posters.
Texas has moved furthest. A similar mandate took effect last year, marking the widest-reaching attempt in the nation to place the Ten Commandments in public school classrooms. Posters began going up as districts accepted donations or paid to have them printed.
Federal judges issued injunctions, meaning court orders barring enforcement, against about two dozen of the state's roughly 1,200 school districts. That left the vast majority of Texas classrooms free to display the posters. In January, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments over the Texas law, and litigation is pending.
Three states, three laws, three different procedural postures. Arkansas is blocked at the district-court level with an appeal coming. Louisiana's mandate is live after a full appellate court cleared the way. Texas is partially enjoined with the 5th Circuit weighing in.
Sanders has committed to appealing Brooks' ruling. That appeal would go to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The Louisiana and Texas cases are already before the 5th Circuit. With federal courts splitting on essentially the same constitutional question, the conditions for Supreme Court review are forming rapidly.
The Arkansas Advocate reported in October that the Ten Commandments had already been posted at the University of Arkansas on the Fayetteville campus. Local media outlets have cited multiple examples of posters going up in Arkansas over the past five months. Whether those displays must now come down depends on the scope of Brooks' ruling, which remains unresolved.
One federal judge, nominated by one president, decided that a law passed by the elected legislature of Arkansas and signed by its governor cannot stand. The people of Arkansas, through their representatives, made a choice about what belongs on the walls of their schools. That choice now rests with appellate judges who will determine whether self-governance still means anything when the subject is the Ten Commandments.
