There is a controversy regarding evolution among the general public, and the general public is who the schools are for.
I agree. The citizens of Louisiana should be able to decide how their taxes are spent with relation to public schooling and what is taught in those public schools, as long as what is taught does not violate the Constitutional rights of the students. To be quite frank, I do not view removal of evolution from the science curriculum to be a violation of a student's Constitutional rights. Teaching creationism would be a violation, but that is a separate topic.
I really do not think that the fervor, at a fundamental level, over removing evolution has to do with Constitutional rights. It has to do with superstition replacing reason. Over the last five hundred to a thousand years we have slowly progressed down a path leading away from superstition towards reason. This new law in Louisiana is a backwards step on this path. Rejecting scientific conclusions based solely on our emotional responses runs counter to the progress that our species has made over the last several centuries.
Science can seamlessly transcend into philosophy (worldviews), and if common ancestor evolution is the only game in town in science classrooms, then there’s nothing that keeps Genesis is wrong from being the topic of the day in science classrooms, and parents have a right to object to it.
I really doubt that you can find "Genesis is wrong" in any science textbook, nor does any science teacher push that. There are still a few biblically based geocentrists around, so do we not allow heliocentrism to be taught because geocentrism says that the bible is wrong? How far do we take it?
It is not science teachers that are teaching "evolution disproves the bible". It is creationists that are teaching this.
An anti-evolution law doesn’t only have to be about promoting religion, it can also be about lessening the promotion of the religion of atheism, which also violates the constitution.
Teaching evolution does not promote atheism. There are millions of theists who accept the theory. Atheism is not promoted in science class, no matter how much you try to pretend that it is.
It’s always interesting how religion/ID must be kept completely out of science classrooms, because, we’re told, it will lead to all sorts of cheapening of science, of establishment of religion, etc, yet if someone claims that studies of only evolution will lead to atheism, the slippery slope fallacy bell is clanged.
If creationists would stop teaching children that christianity is false if evolution is true then there wouldn't be a problem.