We’re waiting to see what the Fifth Circuit is going to do with the lawsuit over Louisiana’s new Ten Commandments law after federal judge John DeGravelles ruled earlier this year that the law is unconstitutional.

The law requires posters be put up in the state’s K-12 classrooms displaying the Ten Commandments, which happen to be the basis for all Western law and morality. Louisiana’s legislators overwhelmingly passed the bill establishing this law, though a Supreme Court case from 1980, Stone v. Graham, established that a display of the Decalogue was unconstitutional. It’s believed by many that the current Supreme Court is likely to reverse Stone v. Graham if given an opportunity, and the Ten Commandments law would be upheld when the current case makes its way to the High Court.

And even that the Fifth Circuit would cite recent precedent to uphold Louisiana’s law. We’ll begin to find out whether that contention holds water on Jan. 23, when oral arguments on the appeal are scheduled.

Only four Louisiana school districts are party to the current legal case, though, so technically, the others in the state could put up the Ten Commandments posters without being bound by a court order not to. And that unnerved the far-left American Civil Liberties Union to such an extent that the ACLU is now sending out nasty letters threatening school districts across Louisiana that they had better not comply with Louisiana law currently on the books, or else…

The ACLU issued a letter to Louisiana school districts and superintendents saying they should not implement Louisiana’s law to display the Ten Commandments in classrooms to avoid litigation.

The letter, sent by four organizations including the ACLU and the ACLU of Louisiana, says public schools whose districts may not be parties in the lawsuit and isn’t subject to the district court’s injunction that prevents the parties involved in the lawsuit from displaying the commandments could still face litigation due to “an independent obligation to respect students’ and families’ constitutional rights.”

“Because the U.S. Constitution supersedes state law, public-school officials may not comply with [the law],” the ACLU said.

Additionally, the ACLU says the law conflicts with the Supreme Court’s ruling in Stone v. Graham in 1980, which struck down a “similar Kentucky statute” that required public schools to post a copy of the Ten Commandments in every classroom.

The current lawsuit has been appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth circuit, but it remains in full effect as the appeal proceeds after the appellate court rejected a request to temporarily suspend the lower court’s injunction.

You’re entitled to wonder what brought this on. Is the ACLU just trying to flex its muscle? Or is that organization worried that many Louisiana school districts would ignore DeGravelles?

Either way, it’s pretty obnoxious that they’re sending out threats of litigation when there is little reason to believe the Ten Commandments are going to start popping up like mushrooms in Louisiana classrooms. When the bill was passed, most involved in its passage understood that this was an effort at changing Supreme Court jurisprudence. Nobody expected it would have any widespread immediate effect. Did the ACLU miss that memo?