The Freedom From Religion Foundation is calling on Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick to retract a recent unconstitutional threat to eject citizens from the state Senate chamber if they do not stand during official prayers.
During the Senate’s Aug. 15 session, Sen. Angela Paxton delivered a Christian invocation “in the name of Jesus, who has saved us, who keeps us safe, and who is coming again.” Immediately afterward, Patrick admonished members of the public gallery who had remained seated: “For those of you who didn’t stand, next time you come to the gallery, you stand for the invocation. It’s respecting the Senate. If you don’t stand for the invocation, I’ll have you removed. We asked you to stand. I’ve never seen a gallery ever have any members in my 17 years of people who refused to stand for the invocation. It will not be tolerated.”
In a letter sent Monday, Aug. 18, FFRF calls Patrick’s directive unconstitutional and discriminatory.
“Citizens have the right to attend legislative proceedings without being coerced into religious observance,” FFRF legal counsel Chris Line writes. “Ordering attendees to stand during a religious exercise is unconstitutionally compelling their participation in religious activity. Conditioning access to government on religious conformity violates the Establishment Clause and the First Amendment rights to free speech and free exercise of religion.”
FFRF points out that Patrick himself once walked out of the Texas Senate chamber during its first Muslim prayer in 2007, saying at the time that even standing respectfully would appear to be an “endorsement” of the prayer. This hypocrisy is par for the course for Patrick, who refers to himself as a “Christian first, conservative second.”
The constitutional principle at stake is clear: No official may compel symbolic acts of faith or deference. As the U.S. Supreme Court declared in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette (1943): “If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein.”
“This is supposed to be a country with religious freedom — which necessarily includes freedom from religion — is seeking to impose compulsory, forced prayer, or at least mandatory obeisance to that prayer,” says FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor. “Government officials cannot threaten citizens with expulsion from their own legislature for declining to participate in a prayer they do not believe in and that shouldn’t even be taking place in the first place.”
Gaylor added that such high-handed tactics are un-American and should be denounced by everyone who reveres the Bill of Rights.
Patrick is currently serving as the chair of President Trump’s so-called “Religious Liberty Commission.” Despite its branding, this commission is not about protecting religious freedom — it’s about advancing religious privilege and promoting a Christian nationalist agenda. Like the “Anti-Christian Bias Task Force,” this body aims to erode the constitutional wall between church and state.
The commission’s mandate includes reviewing federal policies for “religious liberty compliance,” proposing regulatory changes and “amplifying the voices of faith leaders” in public policy. The White House’s fact sheet makes clear this is a vehicle for religious influence in government, indicating its mission is “to end the anti-Christian weaponization of government and unlawful targeting of Christians.”
FFRF is urging Patrick to publicly retract his statement and assure Texans that no one will ever be required to stand — or otherwise participate — in prayer in the Statehouse.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a national nonprofit organization with over 42,000 members and several chapters nationwide, including more than 1,800 members and a chapter in Texas. FFRF’s purposes are to protect the constitutional principle of separation between church and state, and to educate the public on matters relating to nontheism.
