A federal appeals court has blocked Louisiana from enforcing a law that would have required the display of the Ten Commandments in every classroom across the state’s public schools and universities, ruling the statute “plainly unconstitutional” and a violation of the First Amendment.
The legislation, signed by Republican Governor Jeff Landry in June 2024, mandated that all public K-12 schools and state colleges display a poster or framed version of the Ten Commandments, at least 11 by 14 inches in size, with the Commandments as the central focus in a large, readable font. The law was set to take effect on January 1, 2025, and made Louisiana the first state since a 1980 U.S. Supreme Court decision to attempt such a requirement.
Nine families, including several religious leaders with children in Louisiana public schools, filed suit to block the law, arguing it violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, which prohibits government establishment of religion. The plaintiffs represented a diverse set of religious and non-religious backgrounds and contended that the law imposed a government-endorsed religious message on all students.
On June 20, 2025, a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed a lower court’s preliminary injunction, preventing the law from taking effect. Writing for the court, Circuit Judge Irma Carrillo Ramirez cited the 1980 Supreme Court case Stone v. Graham, which struck down a nearly identical Kentucky law for lacking a secular legislative purpose. The court found that, under Stone, Louisiana’s law was “plainly unconstitutional”.
The judges rejected Louisiana’s arguments that the law served a secular, historical, or educational purpose by allowing the Commandments to be displayed alongside documents like the Declaration of Independence. The court noted that the statute required the Ten Commandments to be the central focus and cited legislative debate showing religious motivations behind the law, including statements that the Commandments represented “God’s law” and that the measure was needed to counteract an “attack on Christianity”.
The court also dismissed the state’s reliance on more recent Supreme Court decisions, such as the 2022 ruling involving a Washington state football coach’s right to pray after games, noting that those cases dealt with individual religious expression, not government-mandated religious displays in public schools.
Louisiana’s Republican Attorney General, Liz Murrill, has vowed to seek further review, potentially appealing to the full Fifth Circuit and, if necessary, the U.S. Supreme Court, which currently has a 6-3 conservative majority.
