Judge blocks Arkansas school districts from displaying the Ten Commandments
March 18, 2026
In a ruling issued Monday, a federal judge has ordered six Arkansas school districts not to display the Ten Commandments, saying that such displays would allow the state to “proselytize to children.”
The Christian Post reports that the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Arkansas permanently enjoined the state from enforcing Act 573, which requires public schools to display the Ten Commandments in classrooms.
Monday’s ruling comes after the federal courts had previously issued a preliminary injunction blocking school districts in Fayetteville, Springdale, Bentonville, Siloam Springs, Conway and Lakeside from displaying Ten Commandments posters.
Judge Timothy Brooks wrote, “Act 573’s purpose is only to display a sacred, religious text in a prominent place in every public-school classroom. And the only reason to display a sacred, religious text in every classroom is to proselytize to children. The State has said the quiet part out loud.”
Brooks went on to write, “The law serves no educational purpose, as the State admits, and consequently deprives plaintiffs of their rights. Such deprivations, ‘even for minimal periods of time, constitute irreparable injury.’”
The plaintiff in the case, Samantha Stinson, commented, “The version of the Ten Commandments mandated by Act 573 conflicts with our family’s Jewish tenets and practice, and our belief that our children should receive their religious instruction at home and within our faith community, not from government officials,”
Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, celebrated the ruling, saying, “We are delighted that reason and our secular Constitution have prevailed, and that children would be spared this unconstitutional proselytizing. Our public schools exist to educate, not evangelize a captive audience.”
The Arkansas ruling is the latest in a series of legal decisions against similar laws with federal judges in Louisiana and Texas ordering the removal of Ten Commandments displays from classrooms.
Photo: top, Credit: Getty Images/mtcurado