Liberal Democrats… Please Report to Summer School

Summer School is meant for those students who didn’t pay attention during the regular school year or who just couldn’t cut it academically. And so, while their peers are enjoying lazy days lounging around the pool or at the beach – or perhaps preparing for college by working a summer job – they are forced to sit in an often-stifling hot classroom and relearn information they failed to comprehend the first time around.

That is why, out of the goodness of my heart and a concern for the future of our country, I consider it my patriotic duty to volunteer my services to teach a Summer School class on the First Amendment. Specifically, on the so-called “Establishment Clause” that reads as follows…

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…”

I plan to limit the class size to the first 50 Progressive Democrats, liberal members of the mainstream media (I realize that is redundant), and even a handful of activist judges… especially ones that serve at the federal level.

The reason for the class?

Last Friday, a federal appeals court ruled unanimously in favor of a coalition of Louisiana parents who sued to block a state law that requires public schools and colleges to display the Ten Commandments in classrooms.

“Parents and students challenge a statute requiring public schools to permanently display the Ten Commandments in every classroom in Louisiana. The district court found the statute facially unconstitutional and preliminarily enjoined its enforcement. We affirm,” the court said in its ruling.

For those normal everyday Americans who don’t speak in twisted legalese, what the federal court was saying is that the hanging of an 11” x 14” poster – which is what the Louisiana law required – of the Ten Commandments in a public school classroom somehow violated the First Amendment.

Jonathan Youngwood, a lawyer for the coalition of parents representing Jewish, Christian, Unitarian Universalist and nonreligious backgrounds said the purpose of the law is tied to religion and violates a separation of church and state.

"What makes this so significant is the requirement that it be in every single [classroom] throughout your 13 years in public school, 177 days a year," Youngwood said. "It can't be avoided. It can't be averted."

Thanks for the explanation, Jonathan. I get it now. Drag queens reading to kindergarten children during storybook hour is fine, but a legal-pad sized copy of the Ten Commandments would do irreparable harm to impressionable school children.

With all due respect, Jonathan, you’re a buffoon… and so are the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and the Freedom from Religion Foundation, all of whom supported the plaintiffs.

Meanwhile, Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill promised to appeal the court’s decision, stating that "The Constitution does not bar our Legislature's attempt to teach our students what the Supreme Court has repeatedly said: The Ten Commandments have historical significance as a foundation of our legal system."

Murrill said that no public funds would need to be spent on printing the posters and that they can be supplied through private donations. The law dictates that the posters must include a "context statement" that provides historical context for the commandments, which the state believes makes its law constitutional.

Undaunted by the Louisiana ruling, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed a bill into law the very next day that mirrors the Louisiana statute. According to the Texas Tribune…

“Come September, every public school classroom will be required to display the Ten Commandments – part of a larger push in Texas and beyond to increase the role of religion in schools. On Saturday, Gov. Greg Abbott signed Senate Bill 10, despite a federal court ruling that a similar Louisiana law violated a constitutionally required separation of church and state.”

Good for you, Gov. Abbott. Apparently, you were paying attention in U.S. History class and the judges on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals were not.

And so, for the sake of those jurists – and the aforementioned Progressives, liberal “journalists”, and their fellow activist judges – let me commence with our first lesson.

At the time of the American Revolution, there was one official church in England and that was the appropriately named Church of England. British subjects who did not belong to the official state church were either persecuted or in some cases over the long course of English history, executed.

The colonial version of the Church of England was the Anglican Church and in some of the colonies – Virginia, for instance – you had to be a member of the Anglican Church to vote, hold political office, or own property.

Not surprisingly, when our Founding Fathers drew up the Constitution of the United States, they did not want to duplicate the situation in England… or in Virginia, for that matter. And so, at the insistence of George Mason and James Madison, a Bill of Rights was added to the core text of the Constitution.

At the top of the list was a provision that there be no official state religion – meaning no official state denomination – in the newly established republic.

So, can anyone tell me what official state denomination is established by the posting of the Ten Commandments in a public school classroom? Is it Judaism, since Moses was a Jew and the Ten Commandments are included in Exodus 20 in the Old Testament?

Or is it Southern Baptist… or Methodism… or Presbyterianism… or any of the dozens of Protestant denominations and sects that teach and revere the Ten Commandments? How about Catholicism, Mormonism, or the Jehovah’s Witnesses? Which, pray tell, becomes the official state religion of the United States of America because an 11” x 14” poster is hung in a second-grade class in Baton Rogue or a sixth-grade class in San Antonio?

Do you see just how preposterous, groundless – and downright silly – the Progressives’ argument is? I would respect them more if they were intellectually honest and just admitted that they hate God and everything He stands for.

Thus endeth our first lesson. Class dismissed.