National

Schools Want Ten Commandments Displays, But Can Kids Read Them?

Only 17% of Black students read proficiently by the fourth grade, so how are they going to read the biblical principles?

Jul 18, 2024

pexels-katerina-holmes-5905478 — Katerina Holmes // Pexels

By J. Pharoah Doss, Word in Black

Political scientists define the “culture war” as a conflict between social groups attempting to impose their values on society. Every rule, ordinance, regulation, ballot initiative, and court decision represents the imposition of a particular group’s values, resulting in an ongoing “culture war.”

People often characterize the political left as the initiators of culture war battles because they advocate for social change, yet the reactionary right will start their own culture war battles as soon as opportunities present themselves.

When the Christian right backed Donald Trump in 2016, the left accused them of compromising their own values. However, the Christian right made a “culture war” calculation. The Christian right agreed to back Trump if he pledged to appoint conservative Supreme Court judges.

Trump won and delivered.

The Supreme Court now has a 6-3 conservative majority. The Supreme Court’s new direction gave “red states” the chance to reignite “culture war” battles that the left thought they had already won.

Last month, Louisiana’s Republican governor, Jeff Landry, signed legislation requiring all public school classrooms, from kindergarten to state-funded institutions, to display a poster-size replica of the Ten Commandments.

Hasn’t the Supreme Court ruled against displays of the Ten Commandments?

In 1980, a Kentucky law mandated the display of a copy of the Ten Commandments in every public school classroom. The Supreme Court ruled that Kentucky’s motivation was religious and served no secular purpose. As a result, Kentucky’s Ten Commandments displays were unconstitutional because they violated the “establishment clause,” which states that Congress cannot “make any law respecting an establishment of religion.”

However, in 2005, the Supreme Court found that a 6-foot-tall Ten Commandments monument on the grounds of the Texas state capitol was lawful because it was not only religious but also had historical and cultural significance.

Political commentators believe that Louisiana’s Republican governor signed the Ten Commandments bill to initiate a ‘culture war’ battle.

Louisiana’s Republican governor and legislators insist on displaying the Ten Commandments in classrooms because it is a foundational document for America’s legal system. In other words, their display serves a secular purpose because the Ten Commandments hold the same fundamental importance as the Bill of Rights.

According to reports, Louisiana’s Republican governor told a group of GOP donors only days before signing the Ten Commandments bill that he was looking forward to facing a lawsuit. Political commentators believe that Louisiana’s Republican governor signed the Ten Commandments bill to initiate a “culture war” battle that the conservative Supreme Court will have to resolve. Apparently, Louisiana’s GOP feels that if the Conservative Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, they might also reinterpret the “separation of church and state” in their favor.

Louisiana’s Republican Governor told the public that we must start with Moses’ original law if we want the future generation to develop respect for the rule of law.

Only 17% of Black students and 21% of Latino students read proficiently by the fourth grade.

However, in order for the students to develop respect for the rule of law, they would need to read the Ten Commandments. This is where the governor’s faith leaps right over the illiteracy crisis in his state.

Last year, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), generally known as the nation’s report card, indicated that only 43% of fourth-grade students in the United States scored at or above a proficient level in reading. Minorities experience a significant reduction in literacy rates, with only 17% of Black students and 21% of Latino students reading proficiently by the fourth grade.

Last year, Jaclyn Tripp, an investigative reporter for KTAL NBC 6 News in Shreveport, Lousiana, noted that the state’s illiteracy rate is “worse than the rest of the nation.”

According to Tripp, “at least one-fourth of the population in five of every six parishes in Louisiana suffers from below-basic literacy. Twenty-one percent of adults in Louisiana do not have a high school degree. Fourth-grade testing in Louisiana shows White students are reading at a sixth-grade level, Black students are reading at a second-grade level, Latino students at a third-grade level, and Asian students at a fifth-grade reading level.”

Tripp also reported that studies have shown that people with low literacy levels have limited problem-solving skills when compared to their literate counterparts, and crime rates in neighborhoods where many people are not functionally literate are significantly higher than in neighborhoods with high literacy levels. Two-thirds of fifth-grade students who cannot read proficiently end up on welfare or in jail, and 85% of juveniles in the court system are not functionally literate.

Edwin Louis Cole, founder of the Christian Men’s Network, once remarked, “Building a godly life on the sand of scriptural illiteracy is impossible.” It’s also impossible for the Ten Commandments to help students gain respect for the law if they can barely read them.

J. Pharoah Doss is a columnist for the Chicago Defender.