Oklahoma’s Supreme Court is blocking the state from using taxpayer dollars to buy Bibles for public schools.The state’s top education official, Ryan Walters, has been pushing to acquire 55,000 Bibles to put in every fifth to 12th grade classroom in the state. The “mandate” was first announced in June. However, it has run into several roadblocks when it comes to the funding to follow through on the plan. Last week, the state’s senate appropriations subcommittee rejected his $3 million request for acquiring the Bibles.The Oklahoma Supreme Court this week ordered a stay in a lawsuit aimed at blocking Mr. Walters and the Oklahoma State Department of Education from seeking out bidders to provide the Bibles to schools. The order temporarily blocks “work on any new request by the OSDE for the purchase of Bibles” or bids for suppliers of “supplemental instructional materials that effectively integrate the Bible and character education into elementary-level social studies curriculum.”In October, 32 plaintiffs, including a Baptist pastor, represented by the ACLU, the Freedom From Religious Foundation, and the Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law & Justice, filed the lawsuit seeking to block taxpayer funds from being used to buy the Bibles.After the Oklahoma Supreme Court’s ruling, the ACLU said in a statement, “This victory is an important step toward protecting the religious freedom of every student and parent in Oklahoma. Superintendent Ryan Walters has been abusing his power, and the court checked those abuses today.”“Our diverse coalition of families and clergy remains united against Walters’s extremism and in favor of a core First Amendment principle: the separation of church and state,” it added.In a statement responding to the court order, Mr. Walters said, “The Bible has been a cornerstone of our nation’s history and education for generations. We will continue fighting to ensure students have access to this foundational text in the classroom.”The order came days after Mr. Walters said he was working with singer Lee Greenwood to get the Bibles donated to Oklahoma schools. Specifically, Mr. Walters is looking for donations of the “God Bless the USA” Bibles, which were endorsed by President Trump. The superintendent says the Bible should be included in classroom instruction because it is “indispensable in understanding the development of Western civilization and American exceptionalism, history, and all similar subjects.”His initial mandate to include the Bible in the classrooms at first seemed to be tailored for the “God Bless the USA” Bible because it required the books to be King James Versions and include some of America’s foundational documents such as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution — criteria that only Mr. Greenwood’s version met at the time.The initial order that laid out the specifications for which Bibles would be acceptable was later changed to include other versions. Several other states have taken steps to infuse Christian teachings into public education. Lawmakers in Texas, Kentucky, Georgia, Ohio, Montana, and North Dakota are considering bills that would require that the Ten Commandments be displayed in classrooms. Louisiana also passed a law requiring the Ten Commandments to be displayed, but it has been put on hold pending a legal challenge. The issue of the Bible in schools is not the only matter being fought over religious instruction in Oklahoma. The U.S. Supreme Court is also slated to weigh in on the Constitutionality of a proposal to establish the first-ever publicly funded religious charter school in the country. Arguments in the case are scheduled for late April.
