WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court agreed Friday to take up a culture wars dispute and decide whether parents have a religious freedom right to opt their children out of textbooks and lesson plans with LGBTQ+ themes.
The court voted to hear an appeal from a group of Muslim, Jewish and Christian parents in Montgomery County, Maryland, who spoke out against new picture books for elementary school children, saying, “Celebrate gender transitions, pride parades and pronoun preferences with children ages three and four.”
Initially, the school board responded to the complaints by saying that parents could keep their children away from class if the new textbooks were used or discussed.
However, after seeing a “growing number of opt-out requests,” the school district changed course in 2023, declaring that no opt-outs would be granted “for any reason.”
The parents then sued in federal court, citing the First Amendment's protection of the free exercise of religion.
They were represented by the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. After failing to secure a court order in favor of the parents, they asked the Supreme Court to hear the case and give parents the right to “opt out” of books they say violate their religious beliefs.
They argued that many of the new “inclusivity” books for students in kindergarten through fifth grade promote a progressive ideology about gender and sexuality.
They cited a book that asked 3- and 4-year-olds to look for pictures from a list of words that included “intersex flag,” “drag queen,” “underwear” and “leather.” Another book advocates a “child knows best” approach to gender reassignment, they said.
Eric Baxter, senior counsel at Becket, welcomed the court's intervention.
“It is an affront to our country’s traditions, parental rights and basic human decency to force controversial gender ideology on three-year-olds without their parents’ permission,” he said in a statement. “The court must make it clear: parents, not the state, should decide how and when they introduce their children to sensitive topics surrounding gender and sexuality.”
Last month, the school district's lawyers said there was no reason for the judge to take up the case.
“Every appeals court that has considered the issue has found that the mere exploration of controversial topics in a public school curriculum does not interfere with the free exercise of religion by parents or students,” they said. “Parents who choose to send their children to public school will not have their right to free exercise of religion taken away simply because their children are exposed to curriculum materials that the parents find offensive.”
The judges are expected to hear the Mahmoud vs. Taylor case at the end of April.