Schools must allow parents to opt their children out of curriculum based on religious objections in some scenarios, according to a 6-3 Supreme Court decision handed down Friday.
The key Mahmoud v. Taylor decision signifies a win for parents in Maryland's largest school district and could impact school policies nationwide, as the court weighed in on LGBTQ+ curriculum policies that have contributed to a polarized national landscape.
"For many people of faith, there are few religious acts more important than the religious education of their children," wrote Justice Samuel Alito in the majority opinion. "And the practice of educating one’s children in one’s religious beliefs, like all religious acts and practices, receives a generous measure of constitutional protection."
Alito pointed specifically to LGBTQ+ children's books, such as those portraying same-sex marriage, saying they "are designed to present certain values and beliefs as things to be celebrated, and certain contrary values and beliefs as things to be rejected."
Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elana Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, saying public schools are meant to "offer to children of all faiths and backgrounds an education and an opportunity to practice living in a multicultural society." Yet as a result of the majority opinion, "children must be insulated from exposure to ideas and concepts that may conflict with their parents' religious beliefs," according to the dissent written by Sotomayor, and joined by Kagan and Jackson.
The case rose to the high court after parents appealed a 4th U.S. District Court of Appeals decision May 2024 denying a preliminary injunction to Muslim and Christian parents seeking to opt their children out of elementary school LGBTQ+ books. The decision upheld a lower district court's decision in favor of Maryland's Montgomery County school board.
The parents initially sued in 2023, after Maryland's largest school district rolled out a pre-K-5 LGBTQ+-inclusive language arts curriculum. They claimed their inability to opt their children out violated their First and 14th amendment rights, including their right to determine the religious upbringing of their children.
While the school board had originally offered parents an opt-out, it backtracked after “individual schools could not accommodate the growing number of opt out requests without causing significant disruptions to the classroom environment." The opt-outs created what the board called “unworkable burdens” for educators, according to court documents.
However, the parents said the opt-outs were particularly important for younger students, those in grades pre-K-5. The appeal also came from parents of a student with Down syndrome and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder who said “their daughter’s capacity to make independent judgments is impaired, making her particularly impressionable” to LGBTQ+ material.
The Supreme Court added the case to its docket in January and heard oral arguments in April.
While most justices seemed sympathetic to parental opt-outs during the arguments, there were concerns from both ends of the ideological spectrum — but especially liberal justices — over what they should look like and what the impacts would be, including: Should opt-outs be age specific? Which subjects should they apply to? Would allowing opt-outs also mean parents can shield their children from seeing same-sex couple's photographs on a teacher's desks, for example?
These questions were not answered in the final decision.
However, a majority of the justices said that schools would infringe on parents' religious freedom if they require parents "to submit their children to instruction that poses 'a very real threat of undermining' the religious beliefs and practices that the parents wish to instill."
LGBTQ+ materials introduced by Montgomery County school board and its subsequent decision to forbid opt-outs, they said, poses that threat.
"Many Americans, like the parents in this case, believe that biological sex reflects divine creation, that sex and gender are inseparable, and that children should be encouraged to accept their sex and to live accordingly," the majority opinion states. "The storybooks, however, suggest that it is hurtful, and perhaps even hateful, to hold the view that gender is inextricably bound with biological sex."
The U.S. Department of Education, which has championed excluding what it calls "gender ideology" from schools, celebrated the ruling. U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon called the decision a "major win for religious liberty and parental rights" and that schools, as a result, "can’t shut parents out or disregard their religious obligations to their children."
The public education community was divided in its reaction to the Friday ruling.
The National Parents Union, in a statement, called the case tantamount to censorship.
“This lawsuit was never about protecting children," said Keri Rodrigues, president of the National Parents Union, in a Friday statement. "It was about imposing one group’s beliefs on every family and stripping schools of the ability to reflect the diversity of the real world. That’s not parental rights."
LGBTQ+ advocates and civil rights groups including the American Civil Liberties Union also denounced the decision, saying it could lead to erasure of LGBTQ+ students in school. To prevent that, the National Women's Law Center, a nonprofit organization that advocates for LGBTQ+ inclusion, said schools should ensure students — regardless of background — "can feel seen, safe, and valued in school" in the wake of Friday's decision.
The National Education Association said the decision could also result in self-censorship of educators and the removal of LGBTQ+ books from shelves and curriculum.
Conservative groups, however, celebrated the decision, calling it a victory for religious liberty in public education settings.
"This decision protects family values and religious freedom from ideological overreach, sending a clear warning to every public school in America: respect the sacred, fundamental rights of parents, or face the consequences," said Tiffany Justice, founder of Moms for Liberty, an organization that has successfully pushed for anti-LGBTQ+ legislation such as "Don't Say Gay" laws in states across the country.
