EXCLUSIVE: Sen. King Explains How Texas Is Bringing Biblical Values Of Our Founding Fathers Back To Schools LEGALLY

By Atsme – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, / Shutterstock / Texas State Capitol

Million Voices sat down with Texas Senator Phil King earlier this week to discuss the incredible legislation bringing a Biblical worldview back to the Lonestar State.

You’d be hard pushed not to enjoy a conversation with Sen. Phil King. Unlike a majority of lawmakers, he answers his phone on the second ring, and speaks with an authority that is humble, charming, and pretty hard to debate. He and his colleagues should be out celebrating their back-to-back wins for religious freedoms across Texas, including the passage of laws that mandate schools offer religious education release time, protects freedom of prayer in schools, and returns the Ten Commandments back to their rightful place within the states (and all of the America’s) educational curriculum.

Instead, Sen. King and so many others — including folks in Arkansas, Louisiana, and hopefully Pennsylvania — are fighting to educate their constituents, and the rest of the country, on the importance of bringing the Ten Commandments back to our classroom. (RELATED: SCOTUS Should Uphold Ten Commandments Law, Open Letter Says)

“For 200 years, before the Stone vs. Graham case (1980) in Kentucky took the Ten Commandments out of our schools, kids were exposed to these rules. Kids were educated on how the Ten Commandments was part of Western Civilization; no other document has had such an influence or impact,” King explains, and he’s right. The first ever textbook issued in America, the New England Primer, included a detailed lesson plan on the Ten Commandments.

These rules for life were a normalized part of all of America’s education system until extremely recently, something that shocks many of our readers and members, even those who were raised with the Ten Commandments in their classrooms.

Major Historical Precedent vs. Recent SCOTUS Rulings

“If you look and read through the works of our Founding Fathers, the speeches they gave, the books and articles they wrote, the most quoted source was the Bible,” King notes. “And so we want our kids to read the Ten Commandments are realize that our Founding Fathers, their values and ethics, their principles, came from the Bible, and much of the structure of the U.S., like the separation of powers and things of that nature, that those principles came from the Bible.” (TAKE A POLL: Ten Commandments Bill Signed Into Law; Do You Want Religious Education In Your State?)

“The Bible was a tremendous influence to our Founding Father’s lives, and the way they chose to structure the constitution,” he continues. “Up until around 1971, Judeo-Christian ethics and commentary existed throughout our public square, but when Lemon vs. Kurtzman was written by the Supreme Court, it established the ‘Lemon Test,’ that forced people to check a load of boxes before getting any type of Christianity into our public square. We had a long cultural history of these things, and people have been able to use the ‘Lemon test’ to remove Christ from our public square.”

I joined @tperkins on his program to discuss the progress of the #txlege efforts to restore biblical values in our public schools—including legislation to display the Ten Commandments in classrooms across Texas. Watch here: pic.twitter.com/BqYewdhCSq

— Dan Patrick (@DanPatrick) May 29, 2025

Ghost Of Lemon

“In 2022, the Supreme Court struck down the Lemon test in the Kennedy vs. Bremerton case, but we’ve still got all this bad case law throughout the country built upon this bad ruling. I call it the Ghost of Lemon,” King continues, giving me a phrase I immediately steal to share with you, our wonderful readers and members.

“So one of the things I hope will happen with the Ten Commandment legislation — we know it’ll be used for lawsuits — is that we can work those cases up through the courts, and eventually the Supreme Court will overturn cases like Stone vs. Graham, and this will keep happening throughout all of the laws and cases built upon the ghost of Lemon. There are all these cases, many of which didn’t make it to the Supreme Court, that are built on this now-overturned case law.

“Many local and state courts used this ruling to remove religious freedoms, so we have to undo 54 years or so of bad case law, and we need people to rely on the new law as set by Kennedy vs. Bremerton.”

What Is The Goal Of Ten Commandments Legislation?

“We specified in the law the specific text that needed to be in the posters, including everything from the font, the poster size. We had a lot of people suggest we use a modern translation of the Ten Commandments, and many had good arguments as to why we should do this,” King explains. “But we went with the text to show our consistency with Texas’s historical practices and understandings; we took the language, which is quite King James, because it’s the same version used in textbooks throughout America’s educational history.”

He’s right — and not just about the textbooks. On the grounds of the Texas State Capitol, you can read the Ten Commandments upon a monument. If Texans are anything, it is consistent! (RELATED: ‘Separation Of Church And State Is A Lie’: Legal Precedent Collapses Bringing Religious Freedom To US)

Ten Commandments, Austin Monument

“We’re really hoping two things happen as a result of this legislation: one, you want kids to know that the Ten Commandments are the foundation of our legal system, and the morals and ethics that guide our culture. These Judeo-Christian ethics are part of our history and tradition,” King explained (better than I could), “The second thing is we want our kids to walk into their schools every and see those Ten Commandments, those rules for life, and is the Lord God who says [thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor, etc]. We want kids to see this every day, in every classroom, throughout their education, and to understand how important it is to our culture here in Texas, and to every other state.”

What Should Other States Looking To Enact This Type of Legislation Get Ready For?

“Well, they need to make sure they understand Kennedy vs. Bremerton and the Lemon vs. Kurtzman, and Stone v. Graham and know these cases very well so they can defend the authority that their state now has under Kennedy to bring the Ten Commandments back to classrooms. That’s first and foremost,” King continues. “They also need to be prepared for the challenges to the historical practices and understandings in their state. You have to be very well prepared on having to show the historic links between the Ten Commandments, and American government, education, and culture.”

The other big thing that all states need to be ready with: a mobilized effort that meets the top-down governance from lawmakers like King with grassroots activism from churches, parents groups, organizations, nonprofits, even things like the Rotary Club to the Lions Club.

“There are several groups coming together to support this mission, and we didn’t want to put the pressure on these schools to find the funding to bring the posters to each classroom, but we also specifically said that if people donate a poster to the school, as prescribed in the new law, that they had to accept these posters and put them in the classrooms,” King adds. “We’re going to need a lot of churches and nonprofits, civics clubs and individual citizens to donate or pay to have the posters printed and donated to schools. I hope it’ll be a project taken on by many churches on the local level step up, that they’ll step-up and join together in this mission.”

Texas Continues To Lead The Charge For Religious Freedom

“Texas just had an amazing religious liberty legislative session. There were four bills that passed that are really impactful, one of them being the Ten Commandments,” King concludes. “We brought prayer back into schools. And we now have a requirement that for an hour a day, five days a week, kids can leave school for religious education. We’re hoping local churches will step up and help kids with these missions, and provide that Bible study. Parents will still have to give permission for their kids to go, but we still require the allowance in every district.”

“America wasn’t founded as a Christian nation!”

Reality:

-9/13 original colonies had state churches
-Original law codes were based on the 10 commandments
-Mayflower compact stated the founding purpose was “for the glory of God and advancement of the Christian faith.” pic.twitter.com/bk0fvH34pL

— Smash Baals (@smashbaals) November 28, 2024

Along with Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas are paving the way for religious freedoms across the U.S., and they’re doing it in rapid-fire fashion.

Get Involved With Getting The Ten Commandments In US Schools!

We’re helping to restore the Ten Commandments to America’s public schools — starting with Texas and Arkansas! We can’t do this without your help. Together, we can restore timeless values and build a stronger moral foundation for generations to come.