These Laws Helped Make Arkansas Number-One in Religious Liberty

Religious Freedom, ,

This summer, Arkansas was named number-one in the nation when it comes to protecting religious liberty.

The legal experts at First Liberty analyzed religious freedom laws in all 50 states, and they concluded Arkansas’ laws are the very best. But reaching the top spot did not happen overnight. It took a lot of work from a lot of different people over several years.

Something that separates Arkansas from many other states is the way state law protects healthcare workers’ rights of conscience.

In 2021, Arkansas passed Act 462 by Sen. Kim Hammer (R – Benton) and Rep. Brandt Smith (R – Jonesboro) protecting rights of conscience for doctors, nurses, physician assistants, and other healthcare workers in Arkansas.

Before 2021, healthcare workers had very few conscience protections under Arkansas law. Act 462 helped broaden and strengthen those protections.

In 2025, lawmakers passed Act 970 by Sen. Kim Hammer (R — Benton) and Rep. Lee Johnson (R — Greenwood) strengthening the healthcare workers’ rights of conscience law Arkansas passed in 2021.

Among other things, Act 970 added whistleblower protections for healthcare workers, and it helped protect all medical professionals from having their rights of conscience violated.

You can watch video highlights of Act 970’s passage below.

Last year Arkansas also enacted Act 677 of 2025 by Rep. Robin Lundstrum (R — Elm Springs) and Sen. Gary Stubblefield (R — Branch). The law ensures that religious organizations and religious individuals are not penalized for living out their deeply held religious convictions.

Time and again, wedding venues, bakeries, photography studios, florist shops, and others have been targeted by public officials and dragged into court simply because their owners wanted to operate according to their deeply held convictions.

Act 677 helps prevent the government from burdening the free exercise of religion in Arkansas.

You can watch video of Rep. Lundstrum presenting Act 677 in the Arkansas House of Representatives below.

A lot of people deserve credit for making Arkansas into a leader on religious liberty, and Family Council has been happy to support those good efforts.

Religious liberty is not just the right to believe in something. It’s the right to live according to your faith. Arkansas’ number-one ranking shows the state has some of the best laws in the nation when it comes to protecting religious liberty.

We look forward to working with lawmakers to help Arkansas keep that number-one ranking in the 2027 legislative session.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

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Family Council Joins Brief Asking Supreme Court to Protect Prayer Meetings in Homes

Religious Freedom,

Last week, Family Council joined 55 other conservative, pro-family leaders in an amicus brief asking the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold the right to host prayer meetings at home.

The case is Grand v. City of University Heights, Ohio. Daniel Grand is an Orthodox Jew challenging an Ohio city’s attempt to use zoning laws to stop him from hosting a prayer group in his home.

Our friends at Advancing American Freedom write, “After a neighbor complained to the city’s mayor, the city sent a cease-and-desist letter that said the prayer group was tantamount to operating a house of worship, which would violate the city’s zoning regulations.”

The amicus brief points out that Americans have met for prayer and worship in homes throughout our nation’s history, and that the Constitution protects people’s freedom to exercise their faith.

We have written before about how zoning ordinances are often used to squelch religious freedom.

For example, in 2022, public officials in the Philadelphia suburb of Pottstown, Pennsylvania, issued a citation against two churches operating ministries in their community. NPR affiliate WHYY reported that the churches were cited for violating the city’s zoning code by offering free meals and providing mental health services. Officials later withdrew the citations following public backlash.

If city officials can use zoning laws to stop a Jewish group from gathering for prayer, they could use zoning laws to stop a Christian group from gathering for prayer.

Elected officials have plenty of resources they can use to maintain law and order in communities without restricting religious liberty.

The free exercise of religion is a fundamental right — and it deserves to be treated that way at every level of government.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

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In Louisiana, Ten Commandments Go Back to School

Religious Freedom, ,

The Ten Commandments are going back to school in Louisiana this year.

In 2024, Louisiana passed a law allowing Ten Commandments displays in public school classrooms, but the measure drew immediate legal challenges from groups like the ACLU. However, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the legal challenge was “premature” because the displays had not actually been put up in schools yet. The judges noted that deciding whether the displays are constitutional or not would force the court “to hypothesize an open-ended range of possible classroom displays,” the court said. “[That] is not judging; it is guessing.”

KSLA reports some Louisiana schools began displaying the Ten Commandments during the past school year while others plan to begin displaying them this year.

In April, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said that a Texas law placing the Ten Commandments in school classrooms did not violate the Constitution. The court noted that “no child is required to recite the Commandments, believe them, or affirm their divine origin.”

The legal battles over the Ten Commandments in Texas and Louisiana directly relate to a similar legal battle in Arkansas.

Last year, lawmakers passed Act 573 of 2025 by Sen. Jim Dotson (R — Bentonville) and Rep. Alyssa Brown (R — Heber Springs) requiring privately-funded copies of the Ten Commandments to be displayed in public schools and other public buildings in Arkansas. The measure received strong support from the Arkansas Legislature.

However, lawyers from the ACLU and a group of atheist organizations sued to block the law, and the federal judge presiding over the case issued decisions claiming the Ten Commandments posters would pressure children “to observe, meditate on, venerate, and follow the State’s favored religious text, and to suppress expression of their own religious beliefs and backgrounds at school.”

Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin has asked the 8th Circuit to let reverse the lower court decision and let Arkansas follow Act 573.

Nothing in Act 573 “pressures” students. In 2017, Arkansas passed the National Motto Display Act allowing the national motto — “In God We Trust” — to be displayed in Arkansas’ classrooms along with the U.S. flag and the Arkansas flag. Act 573 amended the National Motto Display Act to add the Ten Commandments to the list of historical items displayed in school.

Over the years, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that states are free to honor and recognize documents or symbols that are important to our nation’s history — like the Ten Commandments or the national motto. Courts have also ruled that public school students are free to study religious texts like the Bible academically.

During her testimony for Act 573 last year, Rep. Alyssa Brown noted that the U.S. Supreme Court now uses a “longstanding history and tradition test” to decide if it is constitutional to display something like a copy of the Ten Commandments. Rep. Brown said, “The Ten Commandments without a doubt will pass this longstanding history and tradition test.”

We believe our federal courts will agree and uphold Act 573 as constitutional.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

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