Dozens of parents, teachers and faith leaders have sued Oklahoma State Superintendent Ryan Walters for mandating Bible instruction in classrooms. The plaintiffs are urging the Oklahoma Supreme Court to halt his office’s controversial directive and prevent the use of state funds to purchase Bibles for that purpose.
The lawsuit, filed Thursday, alleges that Walters violated a state law by issuing the rule and that budgeting $3 million in state funds to purchase the Bibles violates the religious liberty provisions of the state constitution:
The mandate hinders the ability of parents to direct the religious and moral education of their children. The children themselves are confronted in their public schools with coercive education about religion that conflicts with their own beliefs. The teachers must present religious doctrines to their students that the teachers and many students do not subscribe to, or they risk losing their teaching licenses. And the expenditure of state funds to purchase Bibles diverts the tax payments of all adult petitioners from their proper use toward supporting a single religious tradition.
The lawsuit names Walters, the Oklahoma State Education Department and the State Board of Education, as well as other state officials, as defendants. Walters has not explicitly discussed the matter in public comments, but posted Thursday on
The complaint adds to a litany of lawsuits Walters has faced as the Oklahoma school’s top official. (The Oklahoman puts the number at 15 or more.) Local news outlet KTUL reported last week that Walters’ office has racked up at least $100,000 in legal fees from the lawsuits. The lawsuit filed this week is the second challenging the state’s Bible mandate for classrooms.
Since becoming state inspector last year, Walters has stoked controversy by using his position to advance a right-wing, Christian nationalist agenda and fuel culture war grievances. His directive, issued in June, requiring Bible instruction in Oklahoma classrooms has drawn particularly strong criticism, with several school district superintendents saying they would not comply. In announcing the policy, Walters said it was “academic malpractice not to teach the influence of the Bible on American history.”
Earlier this month, his office came under fire again for soliciting bids to supply Bibles for classroom use with such specific criteria that only one version on the market seemed able to meet them: the infamous “God Bless the USA” Donald Trump’s Bible.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
