Justice Gorsuch, the Ten Commandments, and Our National Identity

In 1980, God watched our nation remove displays of the Ten Commandments in classrooms after the Supreme Court held, in Stone v. Graham, thatit was unconstitutional for God’s law to hang in public schools. The Supreme Court’s 1980 decision was not an act of neutrality. It told a watching God that our nation would thrive better without His influence. The Supreme Court and our nation now have the chance to send a different message to God.

The Supreme Court is currently deciding whether to review two recent decisions by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal that put the Ten Commandments back on classroom walls. In February, in Roake v. Brumley, the Fifth Circuit allowed a Louisiana law (H.B. 71) to go into effect that requires public school classrooms to display the Ten Commandments. Similarly, in April, in , the Fifth Circuit issued an opinion upholding a Texas law (S.B. 10) that requires public school classrooms to display the Ten Commandments. In each case, the lower district courts held the laws were unconstitutional based on Supreme Court precedent in Stone. The Fifth Circuit correctly rejected the lower court holdings because Stone was no longer binding precedent. In the 2022 case of Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, Justice Gorsuch had declared that the Court abandoned the legal standard Stone relied upon. Given that development, if the Supreme Court reviews the Fifth Circuit’s recent decisions, it will likely overrule Stone expressly.

Overruling Stone would be a valuable step towards restoring our national relationship with God. But putting His commands back on classroom walls will not fix the root issue that caused its removal. It is synonymous with trying to resuscitate dying fruit on a branch cut off from the vine. In John 15:5 (NIV), Jesus said, “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” If America is a branch from God’s vine, then it depends on its connection to God to yield good fruit. And that connection requires America to acknowledge God’s authority.

The Supreme Court’s decision in Stone revealed that America had stopped acknowledging God’s authority over it. Before Stone, the Supreme Court had habitually acknowledged God’s authority. For instance, in the 1892 case of Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States, the Supreme Court documented America’s religious history, concluding that “this is a religious nation,” “[w]e are a Christian people,” and “this is a Christian nation.” Earlier, former Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story said in his 1829 Harvard address that “[t]here never has been a period of history, in which the Common Law did not recognize Christianity as lying at its foundation.” Furthermore, America’s first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, John Jay, who was distinctly familiar with the Founding and our Constitution, concluded that we are a “Christian nation.” Despite America’s history of recognizing its relationship to God, the nation has since forgotten God’s authority.

Even Justice Gorsuch, who wrote the opinion in Kennedy that seemingly cleared a path for the Ten Commandments to return to classrooms, has spoken as though our national identity is unrelated to God. Earlier this year, Gorsuch said in an interview, “Our nation is not founded on a religion.” He has also repeatedly commented over the past year while promoting his new children’s book that our nation is “not based on a common culture, even, or heritage”; rather, it is based on three universal ideas from the Declaration of Independence: “that all of us are created equal, that each of us has inalienable rights given to us by God, not government, and that we have the right to rule ourselves.”

While the generality of Gorsuch’s language leaves some room for interpretation, it does reveal modern America’s disconnect from its relationship with God. The ideas of the Founding did not exist in a vacuum; they cannot be divorced from the culture that produced them. To do that is tantamount to plucking grape branches off a vine and claiming that those grapes spontaneously grew themselves. Our founding principles came from the God referenced in the Declaration of Independence, who is the God of the Bible. And that is why Chief Justice John Jay, Justice Joseph Story, and other Supreme Court justices have recognized America’s relationship with God.

God is watching every decision our nation makes. Just as God watched the Supreme Court decide Stone in 1980, He is watching now as the Court decides whether His laws deserve a place in classrooms. Repairing our national relationship with God begins with overruling Stone, but truly healing it is only possible through recognizing that America’s national identity is found in Him.

Walker Wildmon serves as the Chief Executive Officer and a Member of the Board of Directors for AFA Action, the 501(c)(4) governmental affairs affiliate of American Family Association (AFA). He is also the Vice President of American Family Association. He has been quoted by CNN, Fox News, and other major news outlets. Walker graduated from Mississippi State University with a degree in Political Science. Walker and his wife, Lexie, are happily married with five children.