Supreme Court to debate if elementary schools may skip parental notice for LGBTQ+ reading

The 6-3 conservative Supreme Court has sided with religious interests in every case it has considered in recent years – allowing a high school football coach to pray on the 50-yard line, permitting taxpayer money to be spent on religious schools and backing a Catholic foster care agency that refused to work with same-sex couples as potential parents.

For Billy Moges, the fight with a Washington, DC-area school district over the reading of LGBTQ+ books in elementary school is a matter of faith. “We have no hate for anyone,” said Moges, one of the Christian parents who sued Maryland’s largest school district over the policy in a case that will be heard at the Supreme Court. “We’re saying that we, as parents, do not want our children to be exposed to these ideas at this age because they’re not ready for it.” But for the Montgomery County Public Schools and civil rights groups, giving way to Moges would lead to an administrative nightmare – requiring teachers to foresee and alert parents to any concept discussed in the classroom that might possibly conflict with their religious beliefs. The Supreme Court will weigh those positions during arguments Tuesday in the most significant religious appeal the justices have confronted in years – a case that sweeps in the struggle over transgender rights, the ability of parents to influence school curriculum and questions about the role of faith in the public sphere. The parents are relying in part on a 1972 precedent in which the Supreme Court allowed Amish families to remove their children from school after the eighth grade, despite a Wisconsin law that required students to remain enrolled until they were 16. The 6-3 conservative Supreme Court has sided with religious interests in every case it has considered in recent years – allowing a high school football coach to pray on the 50-yard line, permitting taxpayer money to be spent on religious schools and backing a Catholic foster care agency that refused to work with same-sex couples as potential parents.