{"id":58795,"date":"2025-11-21T04:32:12","date_gmt":"2025-11-21T04:32:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/58795\/"},"modified":"2025-11-21T04:32:12","modified_gmt":"2025-11-21T04:32:12","slug":"ten-commandments-mandate-in-texas-leads-to-a-mixed-response-and-legal-challenges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/58795\/","title":{"rendered":"Ten Commandments mandate in Texas leads to a mixed response and legal challenges"},"content":{"rendered":"

DALLAS (AP) \u2014 When it became clear to Texas high school theater teacher Gigi Cervantes that she couldn\u2019t ignore a new state law<\/a> requiring the Ten Commandments to be posted in her Fort Worth classroom, she felt she had no choice. She resigned from the job she loved.<\/p>\n

In the small city of Whitesboro, eighth grade U.S. history teacher Dustin Parsons welcomed the new poster on his classroom wall, saying the display helps him demonstrate the influence of Christianity on the country\u2019s founding principles.<\/p>\n

Across Texas, there are no shortage of strong opinions among teachers, parents and students as the state undertakes the nation\u2019s largest attempt to hang the Ten Commandments<\/a> in public schools. In the rush to navigate the Republican-led mandate<\/a> that took effect in September, the rollout has forced some administrators, teachers and school boards to confront hard choices.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just was not going to be a part of forcing or imposing religious doctrine onto my students,\u201d Cervantes said.<\/p>\n

Federal courts have ordered<\/a> more than two dozen of the state\u2019s roughly 1,200 school districts to not hang the posters, including on Tuesday when a judge said the mandate violates First Amendment language guaranteeing religious liberty and forbidding government establishment of religion. Courts have also ruled against similar laws in Arkansas<\/a> and Louisiana<\/a>, and the issue is expected to reach the U.S. Supreme Court.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Gigi<\/p>\n

Gigi Cervantes, who resigned from her position as a theater teacher at a Fort Worth school rather than teach in a classroom where the Ten Commandments are hung, poses for a photo at her home, Wednesday, Nov. 5, 2025, in Fort Worth, Texas. (AP Photo\/Tony Gutierrez)<\/p>\n

Gigi Cervantes, who resigned from her position as a theater teacher at a Fort Worth school rather than teach in a classroom where the Ten Commandments are hung, poses for a photo at her home, Wednesday, Nov. 5, 2025, in Fort Worth, Texas. (AP Photo\/Tony Gutierrez)<\/p>\n

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But many Texas classrooms are far along in implementing a law that has animated school board meetings, spun up guidance about what to say when students ask questions, and led to boxes of donated posters being dropped on the doorsteps of campuses statewide. Some districts didn\u2019t wait: In suburban Dallas, school officials in Frisco spent about $1,800 to print nearly 5,000 posters, even though the law only requires schools to hang the Ten Commandments if the displays are donated. Some schools have no posters to hang.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not evangelizing,\u201d Parsons said. \u201cI\u2019m doing it more from a history source perspective in how they were building the Constitution.\u201d<\/p>\n

School districts face a dilemma<\/p>\n

The law says schools must put donated posters \u201cin a conspicuous place\u201d and requires the writing to be a size and typeface that is visible from anywhere in a classroom to a person with \u201caverage vision.\u201d The displays must also be 16 inches wide and 20 inches tall (40 centimeters wide and 50 centimeters tall).<\/p>\n

South of Austin, the Hays Consolidated Independent School District posted copies of the U.S. Constitution\u2019s Bill of Rights \u2014 which includes the First Amendment \u2014 alongside the state-required Ten Commandments. <\/p>\n

\u201cDistricts are in between a rock and a hard place,\u201d said Elizabeth Beeton, a member of the Galveston Independent School District\u2019s school board.<\/p>\n

Judges blocked the posters in some schools, including some of Texas\u2019 largest, after parents brought lawsuits. In Galveston, the school board voted not to post the commandments until the law\u2019s constitutionality is decided in the courts, but then found themselves the target of a state lawsuit<\/a>. This week, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced lawsuits against two more districts he said were violating the law, though one, the Leander Independent School District said they are displaying donated posters.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Ten<\/p>\n

Ten Commandments and Bill of Rights posters are displayed in a classroom at Lehman High School, in Kyle, Texas, Thursday, Oct. 16, 2025. (AP Photo\/Eric Gay)<\/p>\n

Ten Commandments and Bill of Rights posters are displayed in a classroom at Lehman High School, in Kyle, Texas, Thursday, Oct. 16, 2025. (AP Photo\/Eric Gay)<\/p>\n

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Donors see the posters as a moral guide<\/p>\n

Texas\u2019 law easily passed the GOP-controlled Legislature and Republicans, including President Donald Trump, have backed posting the Ten Commandments<\/a> in classrooms. <\/p>\n

In suburban Dallas, Lorne Liechty rallied his family to raise money for Ten Commandments posters to donate to the Rockwall Independent School District. <\/p>\n

Liechty, an attorney and Rockwall County commissioner, sees the commandments as fundamental to his Christian faith, the country\u2019s legal system and the functioning of society.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are just really good guides for human behavior,\u201d Liechty said. \u201cFor the life of me, I don\u2019t know why people would object to any of these principles.\u201d<\/p>\n

Adriana Bonilla would like to see the posters in her son\u2019s kindergarten near San Antonio. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt assists with moral foundations and it teaches respect and responsibility,\u201d Bonilla said.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Debbie<\/p>\n

Debbie Leimbach displays one of the hundreds of Ten Commandments posters she was preparing to deliver to local public schools in New Braunfels, Texas, Monday, Nov. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Eric Gay)<\/p>\n

Debbie Leimbach displays one of the hundreds of Ten Commandments posters she was preparing to deliver to local public schools in New Braunfels, Texas, Monday, Nov. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Eric Gay)<\/p>\n

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Questions from teachers<\/p>\n

Julie Leahy, director of legal services for the nonprofit Texas Classroom Teachers Association, says teachers have been asking about the consequences of refusing to display the commandments and whether they can also display posters with tenets of other religions.<\/p>\n

She said teachers also ask for guidance on how to handle students\u2019 questions. <\/p>\n

\u201cGenerally speaking, the answer is going to be that the teacher should send them back to their family,\u201d Leahy said.<\/p>\n

While the Austin high school where Rachel Preston teaches has been barred by a court order from displaying the Ten Commandments, she said she and her colleagues are anxious all the same.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re worried specifically about students who don\u2019t identify as Christian feeling unease at the very least at the presence of this in our classrooms, and struggling as well with how do we contextualize this?\u201d Preston said.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Students<\/p>\n

Students work under Ten Commandments and Bill of Rights posters on display in a classroom at Lehman High School, in Kyle, Texas, Thursday, Oct. 16, 2025. (AP Photo\/Eric Gay)<\/p>\n

Students work under Ten Commandments and Bill of Rights posters on display in a classroom at Lehman High School, in Kyle, Texas, Thursday, Oct. 16, 2025. (AP Photo\/Eric Gay)<\/p>\n

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Students debate the posters<\/p>\n

When the Ten Commandments were posted last month throughout 16-year-old Madison Creed\u2019s high school in the small East Texas city of Carthage, she said it briefly became the \u201cbuzz of the school\u201d as students debated whether the religious doctrine belonged there.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody had their opinion about it,\u201d Creed said. \u201cI know talking to a lot of my peers and my classmates that a lot of us don\u2019t agree with it but there is the other portion of the school that does.\u201d<\/p>\n

Word also came that the high school band director had resigned over the law. Johnnie Cotton wrote on Facebook that he believed \u201cvery strongly that politics and religion have no place in the public schools.\u201d <\/p>\n

Creed, who plays in the band, said she understood and agreed with Cotton\u2019s stance, and admired that he stood up for his beliefs, even though his resignation two weeks before a big competition was badly timed.<\/p>\n

Creed\u2019s mother, Tiffany Meadows, said the posting of the commandments didn\u2019t bother her because she and her children are Christians, but that she was worried about students of other religions.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are public schools, these aren\u2019t Christian schools,\u201d Meadows said.<\/p>\n

Cervantes, who said she believed complying with the law breached her students\u2019 First Amendment rights, ended her career at the Fort Worth Academy of Fine Arts this fall by leading her students through a production of Moli\u00e8re\u2019s comedy \u201cThe Imaginary Invalid.\u201d Her students presented her with a signed cast photograph and many said they respected her point of view.<\/p>\n

\u201cI kind of feel like we are living through a time where people who are in positions to be standing up for things are not standing up, not speaking out and there\u2019s a climate of fear,\u201d Cervantes said. \u201cAnd I don\u2019t want to be any part of that.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DALLAS (AP) \u2014 When it became clear to Texas high school theater teacher Gigi Cervantes that she couldn\u2019t…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":58796,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[31178,132,7757,12918,815,102,145,31180,163,7216,490,31179,31176,31181,1967,28061,31182,1968,31659,4119,30367,27,29,28,31177,1760,1499,9931],"class_list":["post-58795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-adriana-bonilla","tag-austin","tag-christianity","tag-constitutional-law","tag-courts","tag-dallas","tag-donald-trump","tag-dustin-parsons","tag-education","tag-galveston","tag-general-news","tag-gigi-cervantes","tag-johnnie-cotton","tag-julie-leahy","tag-ken-paxton","tag-local-news-for-apple","tag-rachel-preston","tag-religion","tag-school-boards","tag-schools","tag-supreme-court-of-the-united-states","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-tiffany-meadows","tag-tx-state-wire","tag-u-s-news","tag-u-s-republican-party"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58795\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}