Religion & Law

Proponents of Prop 8, Anticipating Loss, File Advance Motion For Stay Pending Appeal

Posted on August 04, 2010
The federal district court for the Northern District of California has announced that it will issue its decision in Perry v. Schwarzenegger-- the challenge to the constituitonality of California's Proposition 8 banning same sex marriage-- today. In anticipation of the decision, yesterday proponents of Proposition 8 (apparently anticipating a loss) filed a Motion for Stay Pending Appeal accompanied by a memorandum in support of the motion...

California Federal District Court Strikes Down Proposition 8, The State's Ban On Same-Sex Marriage

Posted on August 04, 2010
In a 138-page opinion today, a federal district court in San Francisco held that California's Proposition 8 that bans same-sex marriage is unconstitutional. In Perry v. Schwarzenegger,(ND CA, Aug. 4, 2010), the court held thatPlaintiffs have demonstrated by overwhelming evidence that Proposition 8 violates their due process and equal protection rights and that they will continue to suffer these constitutional violations until state officials cease enforcement of Proposition 8...

Florida Prisons To Begin Kosher Food Program On Trial Basis

Posted on August 03, 2010
JTA reported yesterday that Florida Governor Charlie Crist has recently signed a directive ordering the state Department of Corrections to provide a kosher food plan for state prison inmates.  A release last month from the Aleph Institute, a Chabad group that serves the needs of Jewish prisoners, says it will begin a 6-month trial of the program at a unit of the South Florida Reception Center in Miami...

Court Says Redacted Holiday Card Form Violated Free Speech

Posted on August 03, 2010
In Pounds v. Katy Independent School District, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 77175 (SD TX, July 30, 2010), a Texas federal district court granted a motion to reconsider its earlier decision involving a First Amendment challenge to a holiday card fundraising project at a Texas elementary school...

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Church Sues Challenging Georgia City's Zoning Law

Posted on August 03, 2010
Last month, a church in Avondale Estates, Georgia filed a federal lawsuit challenging both on their face and as applied the city's zoning ordinance which requires churches to obtain a conditional use permit in order to locate anywhere in the city. The ordinance also requires religious institutions to be located on at least 3 acres and have 100 feet of public street frontage...

Church-State Expert From Now Defunct AJCongress Hired By American Jewish Committee

Posted on August 03, 2010
JTA yesterday reported that following the suspension of activities by the American Jewish Congress, largely for financial reasons (see prior posting), its long-time general counsel and co-executive director, Marc Stern, has been hired by AJCongress' traditional rival, the American Jewish Committee...

Tajikistan Tries To Keep Control Over Muslim Education

Posted on August 03, 2010
Radio Free Europe today reports on efforts by the government of Tajikistan to keep control over Islamic education in the country. All teachers must be licensed by the state, and the government regularly conducts raids on mosques and private homes where they suspect unlicensed classes are being held or underground madrassahs have been created...

Canada Orders Investigation After Veiled Women Permittted To Board Plane Without Facial Identification

Posted on August 03, 2010
Canada's Transport Minister John Baird said on Sunday (full text of statement ) that he has ordered an investigation of whether airlines are properly applying the country's Identity Screening Regulations after the media reported widely on a YouTube video showing two veiled women boarding a plane in Montreal without being asked to show their faces...

3rd Circuit Says Prison Can Bar Muslim Women Employees From Wearing Khimars

Posted on August 03, 2010
In Equal Employment Opportunity Commission v. The Geo Group, Inc., (3d Cir., Aug. 2, 2010), the 3rd Circuit held, in a 2-1 decision, held that a private company which operated a prison under contract with the state did not violate Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act when it refused to accommodate Muslim women employees by allowing them to wear khimars (Muslim scarfs)...

NYC Landmark Board Rejects Landmarking For Controversial Islamic Center Site

Posted on August 03, 2010
New York City's Landmarks Preservation Commission this morning paved the way for construction of a controversial Islamic Center  and mosque two blocks from Ground Zero in lower Manhattan.  According to CNN, the Commission voted 9-0 against landmark status for a building that developers plan to demolish to make room for the planned Center...

Backing of Geert Wilders' Party Is Key To New Coalition Government Agreement In Netherlands

Posted on August 02, 2010
Bloomberg News reports that in the Netherlands, after seven weeks of deadlock, a preliminary agreement to form a government was finally been reached when Geert Wilders' anti-immigrant Freedom Party delegates agreed to back a minority government of Liberals and Christian Democrats...

Paper Begins Series on the Catholic Church In Cuba

Posted on August 02, 2010
Yesterday's National Catholic Register carries the first in a three-part series on the Catholic Church in Cuba. The Church is the only national institution that functions independently of the government. In the 1960's, the government confiscated Church properties...

Trial Set To Start In Long-Pending Establishment Clause Challenge To "Waldorf" Schools

Posted on August 02, 2010
Today's Sacramento Bee reports that a federal court trial is scheduled to begin Aug. 31 in a challenge to two Northern California school districts that have created "Waldorf" schools. The lawsuit, originally filed in 1998 has gone through a number of appeals...

Fired Rastafarian Prison Guards Sue Alleging Discrimination

Posted on August 02, 2010
Saturday's Philadelphia Inquirer reported on a lawsuit filed by three former prison guards who are followers of the Rastafarian faith against Community Education Centers that operates Delaware County's (PA) prison. The guards were fired after they refused for religious reasons to cut their hair, in violation of the prison's grooming policy...

Recent Articles of Interest

Posted on August 02, 2010
From SSRN:Christina E. Wells, Regulating Offensiveness: Snyder v. Phelps, Emotion, and the First Amendment, (University of Missouri School of Law Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2010-14, July 27, 2010).Jeff Redding, Institutional v. Liberal Contexts for Contemporary Non-State, Muslim Civil Dispute Resolution Systems, (Journal of Islamic State Practices in International Law, Vol...

Methodist Minister, Reform Rabbi Co-Officiate At Clinton-Mezvinsky Wedding

Posted on August 01, 2010
UPI reports on the Rhinebeck, New York wedding earlier this evening of Mark Mezvinsky and Chelsea Clinton, daughter of former President Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Speculation over the nature of the wedding ceremony that would join together interfaith couple ended as it was announced that Methodist minister William S...

Israeli Government Wants Church of Holy Sepulchre To Pay Water Bills-- But Legal Complications Exist

Posted on August 01, 2010
Asia News reported Friday that in Israel, authorities in Jerusalem want the church of the Holy Sepulchre to begin paying for water that has traditionally been supplied to it without charge and, in addition, to pay for past water usage back to 1967.  Authorities threaten to cut off the church's water supply if  the bills are not paid...

Lawsuit Challenges LA's Enforcement of Limits On Pot Dispensaries Against Rastafarian Temple

Posted on August 01, 2010
In Los Angeles, California last week, a state court lawsuit was filed by marijuana activist Ed Forchion (also known as NJWeedman) seeking to prevent the enforcement of the city's recently enacted Ordinance 181069 against his Rastafarian Temple. As described by NORML, the new ordinance seeks to limit the number of legally zoned pot dispensaries to fewer than 100...

Estate of Suicide Victim Sues Catholic Diocese For Negligence

Posted on August 01, 2010
AP reported Friday that the estate of a priest abuse victim who committed suicide has filed a lawsuit in a Pennsylvania state court against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh alleging that the suicide resulted from the diocese ending payments for mental health treatments of the victim...

Recent Prisoner Free Exercise Cases

Posted on August 01, 2010
In Smith v. Thompson, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 74666 (ED KY, July 23, 2010), a Kentucky federal district court rejected a prisoner's free exercise, RLUIPA and other challenges to a prison policy that prevents him from wearing his wedding right that contains stones which are contraband...

School Conservator's Remark In Firing Principal Did Not Violate Establishment Clause

Posted on August 01, 2010
In Brown v. North Panola School District, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 76419 (ND MS, July 28, 2010), the former principal of Como Elementary School in Como, Mississippi challenged on various First Amendment and other grounds her firing by a state Conservator who was appointed to take over the low-performing school district that included the school...

ADL Surprisingly Opposes Islamic Center Near Ground Zero

Posted on July 31, 2010
The New York Times reports that in a surprising move yesterday, the Anti-Defamation League came out in opposition to the proposed building of an Islamic center and mosque two blocks from Ground Zero in lower Manhattan, calling instead for an alternative location to b e found...

New Jersey Commission Supports More Aid To Non-Public Schools

Posted on July 30, 2010
On July 20, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie released the report of the Governor?s Study Commission on New Jersey?s Nonpublic Schools. Titled Quality Education for All of New Jersey?s Children: The Importance of Supporting the Complementary Relationship Between New Jersey? s Public and Nonpublic Schools, the report recommends a number of steps to enhance aid to students in private schools, including various tax credits and scholarships...

University of Illinois Keeps Catholic Thought Prof At Least For Next Semester

Posted on July 30, 2010
Yesterday's Chronicle of Higher Education reports that the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champlain will retain an adjunct professor who teaches courses on Introduction to Catholicism and Modern Catholic Thought pending completion of a review by a faculty Committee on Academic Freedom and Tenure...

6th Circuit Denies En Banc Review In Ten Commandments Case

Posted on July 30, 2010
The U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday denied en banc review in ACLU of Kentucky v. McCreary County (full text of court order). In the case, a majority of a 6th Circuit panel (see prior posting) approved issuance of a permanent injunction against display of the 10 Commandments along with other historical documents that refer to God in two Kentucky county court houses...

Swiss Schools Fine Muslim Parents Who Refuse Mixed Swim Classes For Young Girls

Posted on July 30, 2010
Today's Sydney Morning Herald in a story from AFP reports that authorities in Basel, Switzerland have fined five Muslim families that have refused on religious grounds to permit their daughters, all under ten years of age, to attend compulsory mixed-gender swimming classes...

EEOC Says Store Should Have Accommodated Jehovah's Witness' Beliefs

Posted on July 30, 2010
The Charlotte (NC) Business Journal reports that the EEOC yesterday filed a lawsuit against Belk, Inc. in a North Carolina federal district court charging religious discrimination by one of Belk's stores in Raleigh (NC). The suit alleges that Belk wrongfully fired employee Myra Jones-Abid after she refused to wear a Santa hat and apron while working in the store's gift wrapping section...

New Zealand Jewish Community Preparing To Sue Over Ban On Kosher Slaughter

Posted on July 29, 2010
JTA today reports that the Jewish community in New Zealand is preparing to file a lawsuit challenging the government's recent decision refusing to exempt kosher slaughter from a new Animal Welfare Slaughter Code that requires animals be stunned before being killed...

Atheist School Proposal Welcome Under Britain's New Education Policy

Posted on July 29, 2010
Yesterday's London Telegraph reports that Britain's Education Secretary Michael Grove says he would be interested in looking at proposals by individuals such as atheist Prof. Ricard Dawkins for the creation of a "free thinking" school. Around one-third of the government funded schools in Britain are faith schools...

Most of University's Speaker Policy Survives Facial Challenge By Christian Preacher

Posted on July 29, 2010
In Sonnier v. Crain, (5th Cir., July 27, 2010), the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals , in a 2-1 decision, rejected a facial challenge to most parts of Louisiana State University's speaker policy, applying the test that a facial challenge will succeed only if there is no set of circumstances under which the policy would be valid...

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