As we enter into the first days of a new Trump administration, the founders offer good counsel for the nation and its leaders. For example, George Washington said in his Farewell Address that “Of all of the dispositions and habits that lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.”Lawmakers in Louisiana agree. They want young people in the state to consider the role of religion in our nation’s history and have mandated the posting of the Ten Commandments in public-school classrooms. Before the law can go into effect, they must convince a three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse a lower court’s order.

The Constitution is on their side.

Louisiana Law is Challenged in Federal Court

H.B. 71 requires public schools in Louisiana to display the Ten Commandments’ text on “a poster or framed document that is at least eleven inches by fourteen inches,” in “large, easily readable font” that is “the central focus” of the display. Each display of the Commandments must include an explainer: a three-paragraph “context statement” about the history of the Ten Commandments in our nation’s public education. The cost of displays is to be met either through monetary donations or donations of the displays themselves.

Days after Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry signed H.B. 71 into law, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, and Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of a group of parents and students. The suit alleges that H.B. 71 violates the First Amendment’s Establishment and Free Exercise Clauses. It should have been dismissed as pure nonsense, but a lower court, ignoring serious jurisdictional issues, held that H.B. 71 is facially unconstitutional and unconstitutional in all applications.

The court barred the state from implementing the law in certain parishes and ordered that all Louisiana public elementary, secondary and charter schools, as well all public post-secondary education institutions, be notified of the court’s ruling.

The state appealed to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, which has agreed to expedite its review. Oral argument is set for Thursday.

My organization, the Conscience Project, teamed up with Regent University’s professor Mark David Hall to submit an amicus brief in support of Louisiana. We believe that H.B. 71 is entirely consistent with history and tradition and that barring displays of the Ten Commandments in public schools because of their religious significance would constitute a hostility towards religion that is odious to the general anti-discrimination principles of the Constitution.

Let me explain.

There is the Role of History and Tradition

Whether a law violates the Establishment Clause is best understood through the prism of history and tradition. In a recent concurring opinion, Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote that the reason for making history an interpretive anchor, particularly when it comes to broadly stated principles in the Bill of Rights, is that the alternative entails a court that “implement[s] its own policy judgments” about the underlying right. Doing so is not the role of our courts.

There have been distorted interpretations that pitted the Establishment Clause against the Free Exercise Clause and led to unfounded judicial hostility toward religion. Such distortions included reliance on the ahistorical test of Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602 (1971), which called for an examination of a law’s purposes, effects and potential for entanglement with religion.

In 1980, for example, the Supreme Court, relying on Lemon, ruled unconstitutional a Kentucky law requiring public-school classrooms display the Ten Commandments. One of the four dissenters, then-Justice William Rehnquist, rightly insisted, “The Establishment Clause does not require that the public sector be insulated from all things which may have a religious significance or origin.”

The Court has since rejected ahistorical tests in favor of “[a]n analysis focused on original meaning and history” and recognized the legitimacy of public displays with religious character.

What About the “Wall of Separation” Between Church and State?

In 1802, Thomas Jefferson wrote to the Danbury Baptist Association suggesting that the First Amendment created a “wall of separation between Church & State.” As appealing as the wall metaphor is to contemporary activists, it obscures far more than it illuminates.

For starters, Jefferson did not help draft or ratify the First Amendment, so it is not clear why his understanding of it should be privileged. What’s more, his letter was a profoundly political document, not a principled statement of Jefferson’s constitutional views. And, finally, in his public life, Jefferson did not act as if religion had no place in the public square. Instead, the Ten Commandments have always been regarded as a foundation of American law.

The Ten Commandments’ counsel to “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus 20:8) is a perfect example. For example, colonial and state legislatures regularly prohibited work on Sunday. Indeed, 49 of 50 states retained statutes as late as 1961 under which they were found to be constitutionally permissible.

Although the Ten Commandments were not specifically cited at the Constitutional Convention or ratification debates, the convention delegates met every day of the week except Sunday. In short, there can be no doubt that the Third or Fourth Commandment, depending on the numbering scheme, was a source for a great deal of legislation and a constitutional provision.

Are Schools Different?

The Supreme Court rightly recognizes its obligation to be “particularly vigilant in monitoring compliance with the Establishment Clause in elementary and secondary schools.” But unlike mandatory religious activity as part of a public school’s curriculum, such as Bible readings and the recitation of the Lord’s Prayer, found by the Court to violate the Constitution, or religious prayer led by clergy during a middle-school graduation, H.B. 71 mandates only that the Ten Commandments be displayed. No student must study, recite, look at or do anything else with them.

The Ban is Hostile to Religion

H.B. 71 is not intolerant of religious beliefs. Schoolchildren should be given the chance to learn about the role of the Ten Commandments in our country’s history. Doing so is also a sign of tolerance to those faith traditions that embrace the Commandments. By contrast, a ruling by this Court to ban displays of the Ten Commandments in Louisiana schools has blatantly anti-Jewish and anti-Christian implications.

A Victory in Court for Louisiana is Proper

Lacking any reason to bar the display of the Decalogue in Louisiana public-school classrooms, the 5th Circuit should reverse the lower court’s order preventing H.B. 71 from going fully into effect so that students in the state can contemplate those eternal truths, which have shaped our nation’s laws and civil society and continue to guide people today.