Judge Denies TRO Against Texas Ten Commandments Law

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Texas's law requiring the Ten Commandments to be displayed in public school classrooms remains in effect after a Harris County district court denied an emergency request to temporarily block its enforcement.

The August 7 ruling represents the latest development in the legal fight over Senate Bill 10 (SB 10), but it does not resolve the new lawsuit or determine whether the law ultimately complies with Texas religious freedom protections. The court denied the plaintiffs' request for a temporary restraining order and set their request for a temporary injunction for a later hearing.

The immediate consequence is that Senate Bill 10 remains operative. The larger legal question is more complicated because this lawsuit advances claims under Texas law that are materially different from the federal constitutional arguments rejected by the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals earlier this year.

What Texas Senate Bill 10 Requires

Passed in the 89th Legislative Session (2025), SB 10 added Section 1.0041 to the Texas Education Code and requires every public elementary and secondary school to display a durable poster or framed copy of the Ten Commandments in a conspicuous place in each classroom.

The Legislature went beyond requiring a generic representation of the Ten Commandments. The statute prescribes the text that must appear and requires a display measuring at least 16 inches wide by 20 inches tall that is legible to a person with average vision from anywhere in the classroom. Schools must accept privately donated displays that satisfy the statutory requirements and contain no additional content. Districts may purchase compliant copies with district funds, although they are not required to do so.

The law further provides that no public elementary or secondary school is exempt and requires the Texas attorney general to defend schools facing claims arising from compliance, with the state assuming responsibility for associated expenses, costs, judgments, or settlements.

Texas Policy Research (TPR) remained neutral on SB 10 while lawmakers were considering it. Although the legislation implicated several of TPR's principles, the principal concern was whether government should mandate the display of a specific religious text rather than leave that decision to local schools or individual campuses.

That question has since become the subject of multiple legal challenges.

The Fifth Circuit Upheld the Ten Commandments Law

The most significant ruling to date came in Nathan v. Alamo Heights Independent School District.

A federal district court previously blocked implementation of SB 10 after concluding that challengers were likely to prevail on claims under the Establishment Clause and Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment.

That changed in April 2026, when the Fifth Circuit, sitting en banc, reversed the district court and upheld the Texas law. The appeals court concluded that the U.S. Supreme Court's abandonment of the Lemon v. Kurtzman framework undermined the analytical foundation of Stone v. Graham, the 1980 Supreme Court decision invalidating a Kentucky Ten Commandments classroom law. Instead, the Fifth Circuit examined whether Senate Bill 10 resembled the historical characteristics of an establishment of religion at the nation's founding and concluded that it did not.

The Fifth Circuit also rejected the federal Free Exercise Clause challenge. The majority distinguished a passive classroom display from religious instruction or compelled religious participation, emphasizing that SB 10 does not require students to recite the Commandments, affirm their religious origin, or participate in religious exercises.

The ruling removed the principal federal obstacle to implementation of Senate Bill 10, although challengers have indicated that they intend to seek review by the U.S. Supreme Court. But the Fifth Circuit did not necessarily answer every legal challenge that can be brought against the law.

New Senate Bill 10 Lawsuit Raises a Different Legal Challenge

The lawsuit filed in Harris County on July 30 takes a different approach. Rather than simply attempting to relitigate whether Senate Bill 10 violates the First Amendment, the plaintiffs principally rely on protections established under Texas law.

Three mothers, individually and on behalf of their children attending Spring Branch ISD, Houston ISD, and Cypress-Fairbanks ISD schools, sued the State of Texas, Attorney General Ken Paxton (R), Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath, and the three school districts. Their primary argument is that SB 10 violates the Texas Religious Freedom Restoration Act (TRFRA). Alternatively, they contend that the law violates Article I, Section 37 of the Texas Constitution, the parental rights amendment approved by Texas voters in 2025.

TRFRA applies to Texas laws unless the Legislature expressly exempts a law from its protections. It generally prohibits a government agency from substantially burdening a person's free exercise of religion unless the government demonstrates that the burden furthers a compelling governmental interest and is the least restrictive means of doing so.
Importantly, TRFRA expressly provides protections for religious freedom in addition to those available under federal law and the Texas and U.S. constitutions.

The plaintiffs contend that mandatory classroom displays burden their own religious exercise and interfere with their ability to direct the religious upbringing of their children. Their petition includes families whose beliefs incorporate Sikh, Hindu, Jain, and other religious perspectives. They argue that the state-mandated text conflicts with teachings concerning the nature of God, religious imagery, nontheism, equality among religious traditions, and proselytization.

If the plaintiffs establish a substantial burden on religious exercise, they argue TRFRA requires Texas to demonstrate both a compelling governmental interest and that SB 10 represents the least restrictive means of furthering that interest. The plaintiffs contend the state cannot satisfy those requirements. Their alternative argument relies on the state's recently adopted constitutional parental rights provision, which recognizes a parent's fundamental right to exercise care, custody, and control over a child, including decisions concerning the child's upbringing. The plaintiffs argue that mandatory religious displays interfere with that right.

Whatever the ultimate merits of those arguments, they present a different legal question from whether SB 10 constitutes an establishment of religion under the federal Constitution.

Harris County Judge Denies the Senate Bill 10 TRO

The plaintiffs sought emergency relief before the beginning of the new school year. They asked the court to prevent enforcement of Education Code Section 1.0041, prohibit Spring Branch ISD from complying with the law, and require the district to remove Ten Commandments displays already placed in classrooms.

On August 7, the court denied that request.

The order is notably brief. It states that the court reviewed the application for a temporary restraining order, supporting materials, and arguments of counsel before denying the requested relief. It does not provide a substantive explanation of the court's reasoning. The narrow nature of the order is important. A temporary restraining order is emergency relief, and the court's refusal to issue one is not the same as a final judgment that SB 10 complies with TRFRA or the Texas Constitution.

The underlying lawsuit therefore continues. The plaintiffs are seeking a temporary injunction and, ultimately, declaratory and permanent injunctive relief. Their petition asks the court to declare that Education Code Section 1.0041 violates TRFRA or, alternatively, Article I, Section 37 of the Texas Constitution.

The next immediate step is a hearing on the requested temporary injunction, reported as scheduled for August 17.

Texas won the immediate procedural fight. The court has not yet resolved the larger dispute.

Where Senate Bill 10 Stands After the TRO

As of this publication, SB 10 remains in effect, but its implementation is shaped by multiple pieces of ongoing litigation.

The Fifth Circuit has rejected the federal constitutional challenge and reversed the preliminary injunction entered against the law. The Harris County court has now declined to impose a new temporary restraining order based on the plaintiffs' state-law claims.

At the same time, neither legal track is necessarily finished. Challengers to SB 10 have indicated they intend to seek U.S. Supreme Court review of the Fifth Circuit ruling, while the Harris County plaintiffs continue pursuing relief under TRFRA and the Texas Constitution.

The result is two distinct legal questions moving through different channels. The federal litigation concerns whether SB 10 violates the U.S. Constitution. For now, the Fifth Circuit has answered that question in the state's favor. The Harris County litigation instead asks whether Texas has violated religious liberty protections that Texas itself enacted and whether the classroom mandate conflicts with the state's newly constitutionalized protection of parental rights. The denial of the TRO did not answer either of those state-law questions on the merits.

What the Senate Bill 10 Fight Means for Texas Policy

The newest challenge to Senate Bill 10 raises broader policy questions that extend beyond whether the Ten Commandments may appear in a public school classroom. Perhaps the most consequential involves TRFRA itself.

Texas law says government may not substantially burden religious exercise unless it can satisfy strict scrutiny, and the statute expressly states that its protections exist in addition to those available under federal law and the state and federal constitutions. The Fifth Circuit's conclusion that Senate Bill 10 survives a First Amendment challenge therefore does not automatically establish that the law survives TRFRA. If the Harris County plaintiffs establish a substantial burden, the focus could shift from the historical Establishment Clause analysis employed by the Fifth Circuit to whether Texas can demonstrate a compelling governmental interest and prove that a statewide classroom mandate is the least restrictive means of advancing it.

That would be a materially different legal contest and illustrates an important feature of federalism. States may provide protections for individual liberty that extend beyond the minimum protections recognized under the federal Constitution. When they do, those protections constrain state government even when federal law might permit the government's action.

The invocation of Texas's new parental rights amendment raises a similar issue.

Supporters of constitutional parental rights generally envision those protections as a limitation on schools or other government institutions interfering with parents' decisions. But a constitutional right constrains government regardless of which political coalition controls it or whether lawmakers believe the underlying policy serves a worthy purpose.

The plaintiffs are now attempting to apply that principle to Senate Bill 10. Their argument is essentially that if parents possess a fundamental right to direct their children's upbringing, the state must account for that right when imposing a religious display on every public school classroom, including classrooms attended by children whose families hold different religious beliefs.

Whether Texas courts accept that argument remains uncertain. But the case demonstrates why constitutional protections can have consequences beyond the circumstances that motivated their adoption.

The litigation also raises a more fundamental limited government question.

The Ten Commandments have substantial religious, moral, historical, and cultural significance. Recognizing that importance does not necessarily answer whether the state should compel every public school classroom to display a particular version of them. That distinction informed Texas Policy Research's neutral assessment of Senate Bill 10 during the legislative process.

The legislation does not merely permit schools to display the Ten Commandments. It requires them to do so, prescribes the text, establishes the dimensions and visibility of the display, removes discretion from public schools, and provides that no public elementary or secondary school is exempt. For advocates of limited government and individual liberty, policies involving ideas or values they personally support can present some of the most important tests of principle. Agreement with the substance of a government mandate does not, by itself, resolve whether government should impose that mandate.

That question will remain even if Senate Bill 10 ultimately survives every legal challenge against it.

For now, the August 7 TRO denial means the latest attempt to immediately block Senate Bill 10 has failed. The law remains standing, the Fifth Circuit's federal constitutional ruling remains significant, and the new Texas-law challenge continues.

The next stage may tell Texans considerably more than the TRO denial did. As the Harris County case moves forward, courts may have to decide how the state's religious freedom protections and newly adopted parental rights amendment constrain the Legislature itself.

The legal fight over Senate Bill 10 is therefore no longer solely about whether the federal Constitution permits Texas to require the Ten Commandments in classrooms. It is increasingly about whether Texas law permits the state government to require it.

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