The Ten Commandments For the Outside of My Classroom Door

Many people may not be aware that when a public school teacher is first hired, they swear an oath. This oath, like the oath of the presidency, like the oath of the Oklahoma State Superintendent, of the Louisiana Governor’s, like the oath of all who work for US government agencies, involves the duty to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States from enemies foreign and domestic.

Protect and defend the constitution from enemies, foreign and domestic. 

Teachers.

Imagine that?

If you can’t, or if like the State Superintendent of Oklahoma, you choose not to, allow me to give you a constitutional lesson, one it appears Superintendent Ryan Walters missed back in 5th grade. You see, there is no mention of Christianity in our constitution. There is no mention of The Bible, nor of any of The Ten Commandments. 

By design.

There is however, a very clear portion of our US Constitution, called The Establishment Clause, which I have taught for many years and for which I’ve also sworn to defend. In part, it prohibits government from creating a law “respecting an establishment of religion.” It also prohibits government actions that unduly favor one religion over another.

For over 200 years, our US Constitution has separated church and state. All the while, many family and friends I know, soldiers, police officers, firefighters, government employees, and yes even teachers, have upheld our duty to defend it.

Yet, here we are Louisiana. We’re here in Oklahoma, too.  Where are we next?

I’ve decided I’m not waiting for it to arrive outside my classroom door unprepared. I’m not waiting for those domestic actors who missed basic civics and history classes to create unconstitutional conditions in my public institution.  I take oaths seriously, and I plan to defend the US Constitution still, and I plan to fulfill that duty in and out of my classroom. 

Even more so, I only need half the number of commandments Louisiana teachers are asked to hang inside theirs right now. 

Here they are:

The Five Constitutional Commandments 

1. Thou shalt, as I must, observe the US Constitution in this institution.
2. Thou shalt, as I must, study US History and honor the decisions made by the US Supreme Court regarding the separation of church and state spanning generations before us.
3. Thou shalt not force me, or any child in my classroom, to unduly favor one religion over another. If thou wishes a child to favor a religion, thou shall send them to a private school, which you have a constitutional right to do.
4. Anyone in this institution, if that person wishes, may honor thy Bible. Equally, thou shalt, if thou wishes, honor they Quran, thy Torah, or honor no religious texts at all.
5. Thou shalt not place any religious set of conditions inside of our classroom, from any religion, because this is a classroom of the State of California and the government of the United States of America. It is not a classroom in a theocracy.

Let me repeat that again. We are not a theocracy. We are a representative democracy, or if you will, a democratic republic. We are a government of representatives of the people, for the people. Of free people. And the people who wish to defend that freedom, any of them, are patriotic Americans honoring their sworn duties. This is the way it always has been in our great United States of America. It is the way we always will be, so long as we remain united as a democracy in the first place.

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