Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Parents Seeking To Opt Out Their Children From LGBT Books in Elementary Schools

The U.S. Supreme Court is handing a group of religious parents a major win, granting them the ability to opt out their children from lessons involving LGBT storybooks in elementary school classrooms. In a 6-3 ruling Friday, the high court granted a preliminary injunction against Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland, finding that the lack of an opt-out option violates the First Amendment’s protection of the right to the free exercise of religion. The decision sends the case back to a lower court, which will determine whether the board is required to notify parents. However, in the meantime, the court granted an injunction requiring the school board to provide an opt-out option. President Trump called the decision a “great ruling.”“They lost control of the schools. They lost control of their child. This is a tremendous victory for parents,” he said. “I’m not surprised by it. But I am surprised that it went this far.”The decision, written by Justice Samuel Alito, reads, “The Board’s introduction of the ‘LGBTQ+-inclusive’ storybooks, along with its decision to withhold opt outs, places an unconstitutional burden on the parents’ rights to the free exercise of their religion. The parents have therefore shown that they are likely to succeed in their free exercise claims.”The majority opinion stated that while “many Americans” share the view that the stories and lifestyles discussed in the storybooks should be celebrated, “Other Americans wish to present a different moral message to their children. And their ability to present that message is undermined when the exact opposite message is positively reinforced in the public classroom at a very young age.”Additionally, Justice Alito noted that the school board provided teachers with “suggested responses” to questions the children may have about the books, such as informing students that “two men who love each other can decide they want to get married. … There are so many different kinds of families and ways to be a family.”“In other contexts, we have recognized the potentially coercive nature of classroom instruction of this kind,” Justice Alito wrote. “Here, the Board requires teachers to instruct young children using storybooks that explicitly contradict their parents’ religious views, and it encourages the teachers to correct the children and accuse them of being ‘hurtful’ when they express a degree of religious confusion.”He also said the majority disagrees with “the dissent’s deliberately blinkered view that these storybooks and related instruction merely ‘expose students to the ‘message’ that LGBTQ people exist.”Justice Alito said that without an injunction, the parents will have to “either risk their child’s exposure to burdensome instruction, or pay substantial sums for alternative educational services.”Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented from the ruling, saying the “result will be chaos for this nation’s public schools.”“The Court invents a constitutional right to avoid exposure to ‘subtle’ themes ‘contrary to the religious principles’ that parents wish to instill in their children,” Justice Sotomayor said.She also said that the “chaos” caused by the ruling may “inflict long-lasting harm on students’ learning and development.”Justice Sotomayor noted that the school board said the purpose of the book is “to ensure that diverse groups of students are represented.” She said that allowing students to opt out from the books would “emphasize difference rather than sameness and foster exclusion rather than inclusion.”“Today’s ruling threatens the very essence of public education. The Court, in effect, constitutionalizes a parental veto power over curricular choices long left to the democratic process and local administrators,” the justice wrote. “That decision guts our free exercise precedent and strikes at the core premise of public schools: that children may come together to learn not the teachings of a particular faith, but a range of concepts and views that reflect our entire society.”A senior counsel, Eric Baxter, for the firm representing the parents, the Becket Fund, posted on X that the ruling is “a historic victory for parental religious exercise in Maryland and across America.”“Today, the Court restored common sense and made clear that parents — not government — have the final say in how their children are raised,” Mr. Baxter said. In a statement, Montgomery Public County Schools and the Montgomery Board of Education said, “Today’s decision is not the outcome we hoped for or worked toward. It marks a significant challenge for public education nationwide.”“In Montgomery County Public Schools, we will determine the next steps and navigate this moment with integrity and purpose — guided, as always, by our shared values of learning, relationships, respect, excellence, and equity,” the statement said. The case, Mahmoud v. Taylor, began three years ago and brings together a diverse group of Christian, Jewish, and Muslim families in Maryland who say a public school curriculum for pre-K through eighth grade violates their religious beliefs.In October 2022, Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland approved an English Language Arts curriculum that included “storybooks” with LGBT characters. One of the books approved was “Pride Puppy!” It tells the story of a “young child and their family … having a wonderful time together celebrating Pride Day.” A book that is meant for first graders, “IntersectionAllies: We Make Room for All,” discusses topics such as being “non-binary” and determining “what pronouns fit you best.”The case emerged from the parents’ request to opt out their children from reading the books. Montgomery County Public Schools initially offered an option for parents to receive notice and to opt out their children from lessons with those books, a decision that was later reversed. In March 2023, the board removed the notice and opt-out options, saying that allowing them to opt out would cause classroom disruption.Following that decision, a group of religious parents of different faiths sued the school board, arguing that the books went beyond focusing on basic principles of kindness and ventured into indoctrinating the youngest students in sexual and gender ideology. They argued that the lack of the ability to opt out their children violated their right to free exercise of religion. A district court declined to require the school to reinstitute the opt-out policy. In May 2024, a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit declined to issue a preliminary injunction in favor of the parents. The majority found that the parents “have not shown a cognizable burden to support their free exercise claim.”Defenders of the school board argued that the parents brought their case before they had evidence that their rights had been harmed, as the curriculum had not yet been implemented. However, an attorney, Vincent Wagner, with a conservative legal firm, Alliance Defending Freedom, told the Sun that while it is “early in the case,” the argument is not “well-founded,” as it is common for plaintiffs in First Amendment cases to seek early preliminary injunctions. Mr. Wagner noted that the curriculum does not merely tell teachers to read the books to students, but also to be ready to “instruct them to be ready to embrace this particular worldview and how to wrestle with this material.”Critics of parents said that a ruling against the school district would lead to an untenable situation. Vox’s Ian Millhiser wrote, “Every public school would have to provide advance notice to any parent about any lesson that might offend that parent’s religious views.”Mr. Wagner says the opt-out request focuses on the “ahistorical, ideological instruction, indoctrination about sexuality and gender that’s the focus of these parents’ objection.” He also reiterated that the school board initially offered the opt-out policy.

Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Parents Seeking To Opt Out Their Children From LGBT Books in Elementary Schools

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