SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

No. 24–297

TAMER MAHMOUD, ET AL., PETITIONERS v.

THOMAS W. TAYLOR, ET AL.

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF

APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

[June 27, 2025]

 JUSTICE ALITO delivered the opinion of the Court.

The Board of Education of Montgomery County, Maryland (Board), has introduced a variety of “LGBTQ+-inclusive” storybooks into the elementary school curriculum. These books—and associated educational instructions provided to teachers—are designed to “disrupt” children’s thinking about sexuality and gender. The Board has told parents that it will not give them notice when the books are going to be used and that their children’s attendance during those periods is mandatory. A group of parents from diverse religious backgrounds sued to enjoin those policies. They assert that the new curriculum, combined with the Board’s decision to deny opt outs, impermissibly burdens their religious exercise.

Today, we hold that the parents have shown that they are entitled to a preliminary injunction. A government burdens the religious exercise of parents when it requires them to submit their children to instruction that poses “a very real threat of undermining” the religious beliefs and practices that the parents wish to instill. Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U. S. 205, 218 (1972). And a government cannot condition the benefit of free public education on parents’ acceptance of such instruction. Based on these principles, we conclude that the parents are likely to succeed in their challenge to the Board’s policies.

I

With just over one million residents, Montgomery County is Maryland’s most populous county. According to a recent survey, it is also the “most religiously diverse county” in the Nation. In addition to hosting a diverse mix of Christian denominations, the county ranks in the top five in the Nation in per-capita population of Jews, Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists.  The county’s religious diversity is accompanied by strong cultural diversity as well. The county is home to several notable ethnic communities. For example, the Ethiopian community in Silver Spring is one of the largest in the country. And according to one survey, “[o]nly 56.8% of county residents speak English at home.” Most Montgomery County residents with school age children, by choice or necessity, send them to public school. As a general matter, Maryland law requires that resident children ages 5 to 18 “attend a public school regularly during the entire school year.” As an exception to this general rule, the State permits parents to send their children to private school or to educate them at home if certain requirements can be met. Parents who cause their children to be absent unlawfully from school can face fines, mandatory community service, and even imprisonment.

….

This case arises from the Board’s abject refusal to heed widespread and impassioned pleas for accommodation. In the years leading up to 2022, the Board apparently “determined that the books used in its existing curriculum were not representative of many students and families in Montgomery County because they did not include LGBTQ characters.”  The Board therefore decided to introduce into the curriculum what it described as “‘LGBTQ+-inclusive texts.’” As one email sent by MCPS principals reflects, the Board selected the books according to a “Critical Selection Repertoire” that required selectors to review potential texts and ask questions such as: “Is heteronormativity reinforced or disrupted?”; “Is cisnormativity reinforced or disrupted?”; and “Are power hierarchies that uphold the dominant culture reinforced or disrupted?”

In accordance with this “[r]epertoire” and other criteria, the Board eventually selected 13 “LGBTQ+-inclusive” texts for use in the English and Language Arts curriculum from pre-K through 12th grade. At issue in this lawsuit are the five “LGBTQ+-inclusive” storybooks that are approved for students in Kindergarten through fifth grade—in other words, for children who are generally between 5 and 11 years old. A few short descriptions will serve to illustrate the general tenor of the storybooks. Intersection Allies tells the stories of several children from different backgrounds, including Kate, who is apparently a transgender child. One page shows Kate in a sex-neutral or sex-ambiguous bathroom, and Kate proclaims: “My friends defend my choices and place. A bathroom, like all rooms, should be a safe space.” Intersection Allies includes a “Page-By-Page Book Discussion Guide” that asserts: “When we are born, our gender is often decided for us based on our sex . . . . But at any point in our lives, we can choose to identify with one gender, multiple genders, or neither gender.” The discussion guide explains that “Kate prefers the pronouns they/their/them” and asks “What pronouns fit you best?”

 Prince & Knight tells the story of a coming-of-age prince whose parents wish to match him with “a kind and worthy bride.” After meeting with “many ladies,” the prince tells his parents that he is “‘looking for something different in a partner by [his] side.’” Later in the book, the prince falls into the “embrace” of a knight after the two finish battling a fearsome dragon.  After the knight takes off his helmet, the prince and knight “gaz[e] into each other’s eyes, [and] their hearts beg[in] to race.” The whole kingdom later applauds “on the two men’s wedding day.”

Love Violet follows a young girl named Violet who has a crush on her female classmate, Mira. Mira makes Violet’s “heart skip” and “thunde[r] like a hundred galloping horses.” Although Violet is initially too afraid to interact with Mira, the two end up exchanging gifts on Valentine’s Day. Afterwards, the two girls are seen holding hands and “galloping over snowy drifts to see what they might find. Together.”

….

The Board suggested “that teachers incorporate the new texts into the curriculum in the same way that other books are used, namely, to put them on a shelf for students to find on their own; to recommend a book to a student who would enjoy it; to offer the books as an option for literature circles, book clubs, or paired reading groups; or to use them as a read aloud.” And “[a]s with all curriculum resources,” the Board voiced its “expectation that teachers use the LGBTQ-Inclusive Books as part of instruction.” Id., at 605a. An MCPS official has made clear that “[t]eachers cannot . . . elect not to use the LGBTQ-Inclusive Books at all.” The Board also contemplated that instruction involving the “LGBTQ+-inclusive” storybooks would include classroom discussion. In anticipation of such discussion, the Board hosted a “professional development workshop” in the summer of 2022, where it provided teachers with a guidance document suggesting how they might respond to student inquiries regarding the themes presented in the books. For example, if a student asserts that two men

For example, if a student asserts that two men cannot get married, the guidance document encouraged teachers to respond by saying: “When people are adults they can get married. Two men who love each other can decide they want to get married.” If a student claims that a character “can’t be a boy if he was born a girl,” teachers were encouraged to respond: “That comment is hurtful.” And if a student asks “[w]hat’s transgender?”, it was recommended that teachers explain: “When we’re born, people make a guess about our gender and label us ‘boy’ or ‘girl’ based on our body parts. Sometimes they’re right and sometimes they’re wrong.” The guidance document encouraged teachers to “[d]isrupt the either/or thinking” of their students.

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The Board officially launched the “LGBTQ+-inclusive” texts into MCPS schools in the 2022–2023 school year. Shortly thereafter, parents “began contacting individual teachers, principals, or MCPS staff ” about the storybooks and asking that their children be excused from classroom instruction related to them. Some parents showed up at the Board’s public business meetings to express their concerns about the storybooks’ content. In an early 2023 meeting, for example, one parent represented herself as “a voice for parents in [her] community, many of [whom] are actually working today and unable to attend.” She said that MCPS parents were “frustrated” because, in their view, “educators and administrators are going behind what [parents] are teaching their kids at home, and pushing ideas of gender ideology on their kids.”  The parent felt that the Board was “implying to [children] that their religion, their belief system, and their family tradition is actually wrong.”

At the same Board meeting, one Board member responded by saying that “some of the testimony today was disturbing to me personally. Transgender, LGBTQ individuals are not an ideology, they are a reality. . . . [T]here are religions out there that teach that women should only achieve certain subservient roles in life, and MCPS would never think of not having a book in a classroom that showed a woman” in a professional role. The Board’s student member agreed with the sentiment and proclaimed that “ignorance and hate does exist within our community, but please know that every student—each of our 160,000 students in our large county—has a place in the school system.”

Initially, the Board compromised with objecting parents by notifying them when the “LGBTQ+-inclusive” storybooks would be taught and permitting their children to be excused from instruction involving the books. That policy was consistent with the Board’s general “Guidelines for Respecting Religious Diversity,” which at the time provided that “[w]hen possible, schools should try to make reasonable and feasible adjustments to the instructional program to accommodate requests from students, or requests from parents/guardians on behalf of their students, to be excused from specific classroom discussions or activities that they believe would impose a substantial burden on their religious beliefs.”

This compromise, however, did not last long. In March 2023, less than a year after the “LGBTQ+-inclusive” texts were introduced, the Board issued a statement declaring that “[s]tudents and families may not choose to opt out of engaging” with the storybooks and that “teachers will not send home letters to inform families when inclusive books are read in the future.” According to one MCPS official, the Board decided to change its policy because, among other things, “individual principals and teachers could not accommodate the growing number of opt out requests without causing significant disruptions to the classroom environment.” The official also stated that permitting some students to exit the classroom while the storybooks were being taught would expose other students “to social stigma and isolation.” It was therefore announced that any existing accommodations would expire at the end of the 2022–2023 school year.

Shortly after the Board rescinded parental opt outs, more than 1,000 parents signed a petition asking the Board to restore opt out rights. And hundreds of displeased parents, including many Muslim and Ethiopian Orthodox parents, appeared at the Board’s public meetings and implored the Board to allow opt outs. At a May 2023 meeting, one community member testified that “thousands” of parents felt “deeply dismayed and betrayed” by the rescission of opt outs from “content that conflict[s] with their sincerely held religious beliefs.” At the same meeting, an MCPS student testified and asked the Board “to allow students like me to opt out of content and books that contain sensitive and mature topics that go against my religious beliefs.”

The Board was unmoved.

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At the time when this lawsuit was filed, petitioners Tamer Mahmoud and Enas Barakat had three children enrolled in MCPS, including one who was still in elementary school. Mahmoud and Barakat are Muslims who believe “that mankind has been divinely created as male and female” and “that ‘gender’ cannot be unwoven from biological ‘sex’—to the extent the two are even distinct—without rejecting the dignity and direction God bestowed on humanity from the start.” Mahmoud and Barakat believe that it would be “immoral” to expose their “young, impressionable, elementary-aged son” to a curriculum that “undermine[s] Islamic teaching.” And, in their view, “[t]he storybooks at issue in this lawsuit . . . directly undermine [their] efforts to raise” their son in the Islamic faith “because they encourage young children to question their sexuality and gender . . . and to dismiss parental and religious guidance on these issues.”

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Faced with the Board’s decision to rescind opt outs, petitioners filed this lawsuit in the United States District Court for the District of Maryland. Among other things, they asserted that the Board’s no-opt-out policy infringed their right to the free exercise of their religion. They sought a preliminary and permanent injunction “prohibiting the School Board from forcing [their] children and other students—over the objection of their parents—to read, listen to, or discuss” the storybooks. In support of their request, the parents relied heavily on this Court’s decision in Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U. S. 205.

….

In the present case, the parents asserted that Yoder’s principle applies to their situation, and they therefore asked for a preliminary injunction permitting their children to opt out of the challenged instruction pending the completion of their lawsuit. The District Court denied that relief. It characterized the petitioners’ primary argument as an objection to school “indoctrination” and asserted that the petitioners had not “identified any case recognizing a free exercise violation based on indoctrination.”  It dismissed Yoder as “sui generis” and “inexorably linked to the Amish community’s unique religious beliefs and practices.” And although the District Court acknowledged that the “LGBTQ+-inclusive” curriculum might result in petitioners’ being “less likely to succeed” in raising their children in their religious faiths, it nonetheless held that the curriculum was likely consistent with the Free Exercise Clause.

A divided panel of the Fourth Circuit affirmed. The majority did not expressly endorse the District Court’s view regarding the constitutionality of “indoctrination,” but it suggested that petitioners could succeed on their free exercise claim only if they could “show direct or indirect coercion arising out of the exposure” to the storybooks.

…

II

Our Constitution proclaims that “Congress shall make no law . . . prohibiting the free exercise” of religion. And the right to free exercise, like other First Amendment rights, is not “shed . . . at the schoolhouse gate.” Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School Dist., 393 U. S. 503, 506–507 (1969). Government schools, like all government institutions, may not place unconstitutional burdens on religious exercise. The parents assert that the Board’s introduction of the “LGBTQ+-inclusive” storybooks—combined with its decision to withhold notice and opt outs—unconstitutionally burdens their religious exercise.

At this stage, the parents seek a preliminary injunction that would permit them to have their children excused from instruction related to the storybooks while this lawsuit proceeds. To obtain that form of preliminary relief, the parents must show that they are likely to succeed on the merits, that they are likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of preliminary relief, that the balance of equities tips in their favor, and that an injunction would be in the public interest. The parents have made that showing.

III

To begin, we hold that the parents are likely to succeed on their claim that the Board’s policies unconstitutionally burden their religious exercise. “[W]e have long recognized the rights of parents to direct ‘the religious upbringing’ of their children.” And we have held that those rights are violated by government policies that “substantially interfer[e] with the religious development” of children. Such interference, we have observed, “carries with it precisely the kind of objective danger to the free exercise of religion that the First Amendment was designed to prevent.” For the reasons explained below, we conclude that such an “objective danger” is present here.

We start by describing the nature of the religious practice at issue here and explaining why it is burdened by the Board’s policies.

At its heart, the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment protects “the ability of those who hold religious beliefs of all kinds to live out their faiths in daily life through the performance of ” religious acts. And for many people of faith across the country, there are few religious acts more important than the religious education of their children. Indeed, for many Christians, Jews, Muslims, and others, the religious education of children is not merely a preferred practice but rather a religious obligation. The parent petitioners in this case reflect this reality: they all believe they have a “sacred obligation” or “God-given responsibility” to raise their children in a way that is consistent with their religious beliefs and practices.

The practice of educating one’s children in one’s religious beliefs, like all religious acts and practices, receives a generous measure of protection from our Constitution. “Drawing on ‘enduring American tradition,’ we have long recognized the rights of parents to direct ‘the religious upbringing’ of their children.” And this is not merely a right to teach religion in the confines of one’s own home. Rather, it extends to the choices that parents wish to make for their children outside the home. It protects, for example, a parent’s decision to send his or her child to a private religious school instead of a public school.

We have thus recognized limits on the government’s ability to interfere with a student’s religious upbringing in a public school setting.

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As our decision in Yoder reflects, the question whether a law “substantially interfer[es] with the religious development” of a child will always be fact-intensive. It will depend on the specific religious beliefs and practices asserted, as well as the specific nature of the educational requirement or curricular feature at issue. Educational requirements targeted toward very young children, for example, may be analyzed differently from educational requirements for high school students. A court must also consider the specific context in which the instruction or materials at issue are presented. Are they presented in a neutral manner, or are they presented in a manner that is “hostile” to religious viewpoints and designed to impose upon students a “pressure to conform”? We now turn to the application of these principles to this case.

In light of the record before us, we hold that the Board’s introduction of the “LGBTQ+-inclusive” storybooks—combined with its decision to withhold notice to parents and toforbid opt outs—substantially interferes with the religious development of their children and imposes the kind of burden on religious exercise that Yoder found unacceptable.

To understand why, start with the storybooks themselves. Like many books targeted at young children, the books are unmistakably normative. They are clearly designed to present certain values and beliefs as things to be celebrated and certain contrary values and beliefs as things to be rejected.

Take, for example, the message sent by the books concerning same-sex marriage. Many Americans “advocate with utmost, sincere conviction that, by divine precepts, same-sex marriage should not be condoned.” That group includes each of the parents in this case.  The storybooks, however, are designed to present the opposite viewpoint to young, impressionable children who are likely to accept without question any moral messages conveyed by their teachers’ instruction.

For example, the book Prince & Knight clearly conveys the message that same-sex marriage should be accepted by all as a cause for celebration. The young reader is guided to feel distressed at the prince’s failure to find a princess, and then to celebrate when the prince meets his male partner. The book relates that “on the two men’s wedding day, the air filled with cheer and laughter, for the prince and his shining knight would live happily ever after.” Those celebrating the same-sex wedding are not just family members and close friends, but the entire kingdom. For young children, to whom this and the other storybooks are targeted, such celebration is liable to be processed as having moral connotations. If this same-sex marriage makes everyone happy and leads to joyous celebration by all, doesn’t that mean it is in every respect a good thing? 

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These books carry with them “a very real threat of undermining” the religious beliefs that the parents wish to instill in their children. Like the compulsory high school education considered in Yoder, these books impose upon children a set of values and beliefs that are “hostile” to their parents’ religious beliefs. And the books exert upon children a psychological “pressure to conform” to their specific viewpoints. The books therefore present the same kind of “objective danger to the free exercise of religion” that we identified in Yoder.

That “objective danger” is only exacerbated by the fact that the books will be presented to young children by authority figures in elementary school classrooms. As representatives of the Board have admitted, “there is an expectation that teachers use the LGBTQ-Inclusive Books as part of instruction,” and “there will be discussion that ensues.”  The Board has left little mystery as to what that discussion might look like. The Board provided teachers with suggested responses to student questions related to the books, and the responses make it clear that instruction related to the storybooks will “substantially interfer[e]” with the parents’ ability to direct the “religious development” of their children.

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We cannot agree with the decision of the lower courts to dismiss our holding in Yoder out of hand. Although the decision turned on a close analysis of the facts in the record, there is no reason to conclude that the decision is “sui generis” or uniquely “tailored to [its] specific evidence,” as the courts below reasoned. We have never confined Yoder to its facts. To the contrary, we have treated it like any other precedent. We have at times relied on it as a statement of general principles. True, we noted in Yoder that the Amish had made a “convincing showing, one that probably few other religious groups or sects could make.”  But that language must be read in the context of the specific claims raised by the Amish respondents. They did not challenge a discrete educational requirement or element of the curriculum, like the plaintiffs in Barnette. Instead, they asserted a right to withdraw their children from all conventional schooling after a certain age. Such a claim required them to show that the practice of formal education after the eighth grade would substantially and systemically interfere with the religious development of their children. It was on that point that they had made a “convincing showing” that others might struggle to make. But that says nothing at all about whether other parents could make the same convincing showing with respect to more specific educational requirements.

Yoder is an important precedent of this Court, and it cannot be breezily dismissed as a special exception granted to one particular religious minority. It instead embodies a principle of general applicability, and that principle provides more robust protection for religious liberty than the alarmingly narrow rule that the dissent propounds. The dissent sees the Free Exercise Clause’s guarantee as nothing more than protection against compulsion or coercion to renounce or abandon one’s religion. Under this test, even instruction that denigrates or ridicules students’ religious beliefs would apparently be allowed.

We reject this chilling vision of the power of the state to strip away the critical right of parents to guide the religious development of their children. Yoder and Barnette embody a very different view of religious liberty, one that comports with the fundamental values of the American people.

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For these reasons, we conclude that the Board’s introduction of the “LGBTQ+-inclusive” storybooks, combined with its no-opt-out policy, burdens the parents’ right to the free exercise of religion. We now turn to the question whether that burden is constitutionally permitted.

Under our precedents, the government is generally free to place incidental burdens on religious exercise so long as it does so pursuant to a neutral policy that is generally applicable. Smith. Thus, in most circumstances, two questions remain after a burden on religious exercise is found. First, a court must ask if the burdensome policy is neutral and generally applicable. Second, if the first question can be answered in the negative, a court will proceed to ask whether the policy can survive strict scrutiny. Under that standard, the government must demonstrate that “its course was justified by a compelling state interest and was narrowly tailored in pursuit of that interest.”

Here, the character of the burden requires us to proceed differently. When the burden imposed is of the same character as that imposed in Yoder, we need not ask whether the law at issue is neutral or generally applicable before proceeding to strict scrutiny. That much is clear from our decisions in Yoder and Smith.

In Yoder, the Court rejected the contention that the case could be “disposed of on the grounds that Wisconsin’s requirement . . . applies uniformly to all citizens of the State and does not, on its face, discriminate against religions or a particular religion.” Instead, the Court bypassed those issues and proceeded to subject the law to close judicial scrutiny, asking whether the State’s interest “in its system of compulsory education [was] so compelling that even the established religious practices of the Amish must give way.”

Then, in Smith, we recognized Yoder as an exception to the general rule that governments may burden religious exercise pursuant to neutral and generally applicable laws. Specifically, we described Yoder as a case “in which we have held that the First Amendment bars application of a neutral, generally applicable law to religiously motivated action.” And we explained that the general rule did not apply in Yoder because of the special character of the burden in that case. Thus, when a law imposes a burden of the same character as that in Yoder, strict scrutiny is appropriate regardless of whether the law is neutral or generally applicable.

As we have explained, the burden in this case is of the exact same character as the burden in Yoder. The Board’s policies, like the compulsory-attendance requirement in Yoder, “substantially interfer[e] with the religious development” of the parents’ children. And those policies pose “a very real threat of undermining” the religious beliefs and practices that the parents wish to instill in their children. We therefore proceed to consider whether the policies can survive strict scrutiny.

To survive strict scrutiny, a government must demonstrate that its policy “advances ‘interests of the highest order’ and is narrowly tailored to achieve those interests.” In its filings before us, the Board asserts that its curriculum and no-opt-out policy serve its compelling interest in “maintaining a school environment that is safe and conducive to learning for all students.” It relies on the statements of an MCPS official who testified that permitting opt outs would result in “significant disruptions to the classroom environment” and would expose certain students to “social stigma and isolation.”

We do not doubt that, as a general matter, schools have a “compelling interest in having an undisrupted school session conducive to the students’ learning.” But the Board’s conduct undermines its assertion that its no-opt-out policy is necessary to serve that interest. As we have noted, the Board continues to permit opt outs in a variety of other circumstances, including for “noncurricular” activities and the “Family Life and Human Sexuality” unit of instruction, for which opt outs are required under Maryland law. This robust “system of exceptions” undermines the Board’s contention that the provision of opt outs to religious parents would be infeasible or unworkable.

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Nor can the Board’s policies be justified by its asserted interest in protecting students from “social stigma and isolation.” In Maryland, the “Family Life and Human Sexuality” unit of instruction includes discussions about sexuality and gender. Yet the Board has not suggested that the legally-required provision of opt outs from that curriculum has resulted in stigma or isolation. Even if it did, the Board cannot purport to rescue one group of students from stigma and isolation by stigmatizing and isolating another.

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IV

The Board’s introduction of the “LGBTQ+-inclusive” storybooks, along with its decision to withhold opt outs, places an unconstitutional burden on the parents’ rights to the free exercise of their religion. The parents have therefore shown that they are likely to succeed in their free exercise claims. They have likewise shown entitlement to a preliminary injunction pending the completion of this lawsuit. In the absence of an injunction, the parents will continue to be put to a choice: either risk their child’s exposure to burdensome instruction, or pay substantial sums for alternative educational services. As we have explained, that choice unconstitutionally burdens the parents’ religious exercise, and “‘[t]he loss of First Amendment freedoms, for even minimal periods of time, unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury.’” 

Furthermore, in light of the strong showing made by the parents here, and the lack of a compelling interest supporting the Board’s policies, an injunction is both equitable and in the public interest. The petitioners should receive preliminary relief while this lawsuit proceeds. Specifically, until all appellate review in this case is completed, the Board should be ordered to notify them in advance whenever one of the books in question or any other similar book is to be used in any way and to allow them to have their children excused from that instruction.

The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

It is so ordered.

JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, with whom JUSTICE KAGAN and JUSTICE JACKSON join, dissenting.

Public schools, this Court has said, are “‘at once the symbol of our democracy and the most pervasive means for promoting our common destiny.’  They offer to children of all faiths and backgrounds an education and an opportunity to practice living in our multicultural society. That experience is critical to our Nation’s civic vitality. Yet it will become a mere memory if children must be insulated from exposure to ideas and concepts that may conflict with their parents’ religious beliefs.

Today’s ruling ushers in that new reality. Casting aside longstanding precedent, the Court invents a constitutional right to avoid exposure to “subtle” themes “contrary to the religious principles” that parents wish to instill in their children. Exposing students to the “message” that LGBTQ people exist, and that their loved ones may celebrate their marriages and life events, the majority says, is enough to trigger the most demanding form of judicial scrutiny. That novel rule is squarely foreclosed by our precedent and offers no limiting principle.

Given the great diversity of religious beliefs in this country, countless interactions that occur every day in public schools might expose children to messages that conflict with a parent’s religious beliefs. If that is sufficient to trigger strict scrutiny, then little is not.

The result will be chaos for this Nation’s public schools. Requiring schools to provide advance notice and the chance to opt out of every lesson plan or story time that might implicate a parent’s religious beliefs will impose impossible administrative burdens on schools. The harm will not be borne by educators alone: Children will suffer too. Classroom disruptions and absences may well inflict long-lasting harm on students’ learning and development.

Worse yet, the majority closes its eyes to the inevitable chilling effects of its ruling. Many school districts, and particularly the most resource strapped, cannot afford to engage in costly litigation over opt-out rights or to divert resources to tracking and managing student absences. Schools may instead censor their curricula, stripping material that risks generating religious objections. The Court’s ruling, in effect, thus hands a subset of parents the right to veto curricular choices long left to locally elected school boards. Because I cannot countenance the Court’s contortion of our precedent and the untold harms that will follow, I dissent.