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House Bill 1231, which would have required schools to display the Ten Commandments, was introduced during the 2025 session of the Indiana General Assembly but did not get a hearing. (Photo/Pexels.com)

This column was originally published on The Throckmorton Initiative, a blog written by Warren Throckmorton.

By Warren Throckmorton
August 31, 2025

I recently read an op-ed by Daniel Darling about state laws requiring the Ten Commandments be posted in public school classrooms. Darling, who is Director of The Land Center for Cultural Engagement at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, favors such laws. Darling’s bio says he is a “thought leader” which seems like a big responsibility.

Anyway, what caught my eye in his column was his critique of Texas state representative James Talerico’s position on Texas’ Ten Commandment law. In case you missed it, Texas recently joined Louisiana and Arkansas in requiring public schools to post a copy of the Ten Commandments in every classroom. A federal judge recently decided some districts don’t have to do that, but Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who has had some personal experience with the Ten Commandments, decided to tell the rest of Texas schools that the court decision didn’t apply to them. Those districts must post all Ten Commandments, just the way Protestants decided they should look on a wall.

Paxton’s letter to the school districts identifies those who object to religious coercion as “woke.” He said, “Schools not enjoined by ongoing litigation must abide by S.B. 10 and display the Ten Commandments. The woke radicals seeking to erase our nation’s history will be defeated. I will not back down from defending the virtues and values that built this country.”

Daniel Darling takes a similar position defending the idea of posting the Ten Commandments. He quotes John Adams and his son John Quincy Adams in support and then says, “To post the Ten Commandments in the classroom is not an imposition of the Christian religion by the state but an acknowledgement of history by public schools.”

I disagree with both Paxton and Darling. I believe this law is all about imposing Christianity; it isn’t at all about history.

Posting the Ten Commandments is an imposition of Christianity, particularly Protestant Christianity. The version Texas is using is the Protestant line up of the Decalogue. There are other versions as well. The Texas legislature took sides on the matter. So in addition to imposing religious belief (I am the Lord your God) on nonreligious school children, and imposing an arrangement of Jewish scripture which Christians have adopted as Holy on children of other religions, the legislature imposed a particular slant on their coercive policy.

This isn’t about history either. As John Fea points out, there isn’t a historical basis for selecting the Decalogue as the only influence on American law. If the Big Ten are going to be posted, then so too should many other influences. Fea writes on his blog:

But even more revealing is Paxton’s appeal to the American founding: “I will not back down from defending the virtues and values that built this county.” While I have no problem with people bringing attention to the Judeo-Christian values that informed the American founding, I would oppose the idea that our country was built solely on these values. The Founding Fathers drew on a host of ideas–pagan Greek and Roman writers, the Enlightenment, and contemporary political writers.

Why doesn’t the Texas legislature require public schools to post the writings of Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Cicero, Horace, Ovid, Marcus Aurelius, Montesquieu, Frances Hutcheson, Adam Smith, David Hume, John Locke, Thomas Paine, James Harrington, Algernon Sydney, Plato, Aristotle, and others?

Good question. Why don’t they include other influences on law? Why only the Big Ten?

Darling gives away his Christian privilege at the end of his op-ed: “What’s more, the mere presence of a poster containing the Ten Commandments will not harm even those who don’t share the Christian faith. They can look away if they are so inclined.”

Easy for him to say. He’s a member of the dominant religion. Let’s reverse the situation and see how sanguine Darling is. If Texas mandated a listing of sayings of Plato or Epicurus, what would Darling do? Darling mentions John Adams; Adams questioned the source of the commandments and what statements should be in the list. Adams’ speculations about the Ten Commandments based on the research of J. W. Goethens Schristen would not look like the list posted in Texas. What if we listed Schristen’s version?

Invoking another founder, what if the legislature wanted students to study Thomas Jefferson’s advice to his nephew Peter Carr:

Religion. your reason is now mature enough to examine this object. in the first place divest yourself of all bias in favour of novelty & singularity of opinion. indulge them in any other subject rather than that of religion. it is too important, & the consequences of error may be too serious. on the other hand shake off all the fears & servile prejudices under which weak minds are servilely crouched. fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. question with boldness even the existence of a god; because, if there be one, he must more approve the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear … I repeat that you must lay aside all prejudice on both sides, and neither believe nor reject any thing because any other person, or description of persons have rejected or believed it. your own reason is the only oracle given you by heaven, and you are answerable not for the rightness but uprightness of the decision. But if those students did happen to catch a glance, they might be inspired to not steal or not covet. Would society be worse off if, among the crowded collection of inspirational sayings on the wall, these ideas took hold?

This is certainly historical, said by our third president as moral advice. Why is this not posted on school walls? The answer is because the legislature has taken sides on religion. They have established a version of Christianity as the state religion of the Texas public schools and are hell bent on coercing all Texas school children to deal with it.

Texas legislators and Daniel Darling say they aren’t engaging in religious coercion, but they justify their deeds by making religious arguments. To me, it seems pretty obvious what this is about. Thus far, the courts have considered these laws to be unconstitutional establishments of religion. I hope the Supreme Court continues to agree.