Religion & Law

3rd Circuit: No Qualified Immunity In Suit Challenging Refusal To Issue "Choose Life" Plates

Posted on April 13, 2010
Children First Foundation, Inc. v. Legreide, (3d Cir., April 9, 2010), is a challenge to New Jersey's rejection of an application for the issuance of "Choose Life" license plates under the statute that permits issuance of special plates to members of non-profit groups...

Campaign In Britain For Arrest of Pope Benedict

Posted on April 13, 2010
The London Telegraph reported Sunday on a campaign by well-known atheists Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens to ask the Crown Prosecution Service to arrest Pope Benedict XVI on criminal charges under international law when he visits London on September 16-19...

Evangelicals Urge Christian Approach To Nuclear Reduction

Posted on April 13, 2010
As the Nuclear Security Summit convened in Washington, D.C. (White House statement), yesterday Ekklesia reported on the "Matthew 5 Project: Evangelicals for Nuclear Reduction." Evangelical leaders, including Rick Warren, have sent a statement (full text) to the President, Vice President, Secretaries of State and Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and all members of Congress...

Vatican Posts New Guidelines On Clerical Sexual Abuse Investigations

Posted on April 13, 2010
Voice of America reported yesterday that the Vatican has posted simple new guidelines on its website outlining how complaints of clerical sexual abuse of minors are to be handled. The Vatican's Guide (full text) provides in part: The local diocese investigates every allegation of sexual abuse of a minor by a cleric...

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Connecticut Bishops Oppose Ending Statute of Limitations On Child Sex Abuse Claims

Posted on April 12, 2010
CNN reported yesterday that Catholic Bishops in Connecticut are urging parishioners to strongly oppose a bill pending in the state legislature that would remove the statute of limitations in child sexual abuse cases. (Full text of HB 5473). A letter from the Bishops reads in part: Over the past several years in states that have even temporarily eliminated the statutes, it has caused the bankruptcy of at least seven dioceses...

Bangladesh High Court Says Women Employed In Education Cannot Be Forced To Wear Veil

Posted on April 12, 2010
Asia News reports that Bangladesh's High Court ruled on April 8 that women employed in public educational institutions may not be required to wear the veil, or hijab, against their will. The ruling came in a lawsuit filed after a local government official called the director of an elementary school a "beshya" (prostitute) for not wearing a veil...

Additional Recent Prisoner Free Exercise Cases

Posted on April 12, 2010
In Babcock v. Clarke, (9th Cir., April 6, 2010), the 9th Circuit held that requiring an inmate to use his committed name along with his religious name on correspondence, intead of his religious name alone, and requiring staff to refer to him only by his committed name, does not violate RLUIPA or the free exercise clause...

RLUIPA Suit Challenges Denial of Rezoning For Islamic Learning Center

Posted on April 12, 2010
The Council on American-Islamic relations last week announced that it had filed a RLUIPA lawsuit in federal court in Chicago challenging DuPage County's rejection of a zoning permit for the Irshad Learning Center that would serve some 30 Shia Muslim families primarily of Middle Eastern origin...

Recent Articles of Interest

Posted on April 12, 2010
From SSRN:Thomas Charles Berg, What Same-Sex Marriage and Religious Liberty Claims Have in Common, (Northwestern Journal of Law and Social Policy, Forthcoming).Julie A. Oseid, The Power of Metaphor: Thomas Jefferson?s 'Wall of Separation between Church & State', (U of St...

British Religious Leaders Want Special Judicial Panel To Hear Religious Rights Cases

Posted on April 11, 2010
Today's London Times reports that Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, and other church leaders will support a motion being filed by attorneys for Christain relationship counsellor Gary McFarlane calling for a special Court of Appeals panel of five judges who understand religious issues to be appointed to hear McFarlane's appeal and future appeals involving religious rights...

Dutch Supreme Court Tells Christian Political Party To Give Women Leadership Roles

Posted on April 11, 2010
According to AP, Netherlands Supreme Court on Friday rejected religious freedom arguments and ruled that the fundamentalist Christian inspired Political Reformed Party (SGP) must accept women in leadership roles. The court held that the party's policies are in conflict with the 1979 U...

Minister-Social Worker's Claim Under Title VII Survives Motion To Dismiss

Posted on April 11, 2010
In Moore v. Metropolitan Human Service District, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 34808 (ED LA, April 7, 2010), a Louisiana federal district court held that an ordained minister employed as a social worker at a state agency that provides services to individuals with addictive disorders stated a plausible religious discrimination claim under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act...

Recent Prisoner Free Exercise Cases

Posted on April 11, 2010
In Abdulhaseeb v. Calbone (10th Cir., April 2, 2010), the 10th Circuit held that a Muslim prisoner adequately demonstrated the existence of a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the denial of halal food, and the denial of halal meat for an Islamic feast, substantially burdened his religious exercise...

Unique Arrangement For Catholic Schools Converted To Charter Schools

Posted on April 10, 2010
In Indianapolis, Indiana last Monday, officials approved the conversion of two Catholic elementary schools into taxpayer-supported charter schools. According to today's Louisville (KY) Courier-Journal, unlike similar conversions in New York City and Washington, D...

11th Circuit: Ministerial Exception Doctrine Applies To Suits Under Section 1981

Posted on April 10, 2010
In McCants v. Alabama-West Florida Conference of the United Methodist Church, Inc., (11th Cir., April 5, 2010), the 11th Circuit dismissed a suit brought by an African-American former pastor of the United Methodist Church against his former church employer...

5th Circuit Hears Oral Arguments In Religious Candy Cane Lawsuit

Posted on April 10, 2010
On Wednesday, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments in Moran v. Plano Independent School District. (Audio recording of oral arguments.) Last December, the 5th Circuit remanded to the district court the question of whether school rules in effect prior to 2005 that restricted the distribution of materials by students were constitutional...

New Jersey Supreme Court Defines Cleric-Penitent Privilege

Posted on April 09, 2010
In a decision handed down Wednesday, the New Jersey Supreme Court, for the first time since N.J.S.A. 2A:84A-23 was amended in 1994, defined the scope of the cleric-penitent privilege. In State of New Jersey v. J.G., (NJ Sup. Ct., April 7, 2010), in a 6-1 decision, the court held that: the cleric-penitent privilege applies when, under the totality of the circumstances, an objectively reasonable penitent would believe that a communication was secret, that is, made in confidence to a cleric in the cleric's professional character or role as a spiritual advisor...

Anti-Abortion Tax Protester Sent To Jail In Canada

Posted on April 09, 2010
In Canada, a judge in Fredericton, New Brunswick has ordered anti-abortion tax protester, David Little, to jail for 66 days for refusing to pay $3000 in fines imposed when he was convicted of failing to file tax returns. According to yesterday's Winnipeg Free Press, Little, a 66-year old Roman Catholic, says he will never file a tax return so long as there is tax-funded abortion in Canada...

Priest's Suit Against Bishop Dismissed On Church Autonomy Grounds

Posted on April 09, 2010
A Nevada trial court has dismissed on church autonomy grounds a lawsuit brought by Rev. Richard DeMolen, a Catholic priest, against the Diocese of Reno and Bishop Randolph Calvo. The priest claimed that Bishop Calvo defamed him in a letter sent to parishioners...

British Nurse Loses In Bid To Wear Cross On Necklace

Posted on April 09, 2010
Earlier this week, an Employment Tribunal in Britain upheld a decision by a hospital banning Christian nurse Shirley Chaplin from wearing a cross on a chain around her neck. According to Wednesday's BBC News, the hospital's dress code bars front-line staff from wearing necklaces because patients might grab them...

Indian Court Rejects Government Involvement In Islamic Bank

Posted on April 09, 2010
In the Indian state of Kerala, a 2-judge bench of the High Court held that neither the state nor any of its instrumentalities may be involved with the creation of an Islamic banking institution. According to today's Business Standard and The Peninsula, the ruling came in a public interest lawsuit that alleged government involvement in a Shariah-compliant bank would amount to unconstitutional preference for one religion...

Claims Against Controversial School Teacher Survive Summary Judgment Motion

Posted on April 09, 2010
In Doe v. Mount Vernon City School District Board of Education, (SD OH, April 6, 2010), an Ohio federal district court ruled on several summary judgment motions in the lawsuit against controversial middle school science teacher John Freshwater by one of his students...

Federal Lawsuit Challenges Capital Appropriations To Religious Organizations

Posted on April 09, 2010
Chicago activist Rob Sherman has taken another step in his campaign to challenge the state legislative appropriations to houses of worship, parochial schools and religious institutions that were placed in last year's Illinois capital budget. (See prior posting...

Justice Stevens Announces Retirement

Posted on April 09, 2010
The Washington Post reports that today U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens notified President Obama that he will retire one day after the end of the current Supreme Court term. (Full text of Stevens resignation letter.) Justice Stevens religion clause jurisprudence is reviewed in the following articles: Eduardo M...

Ecclesiastical Abstention Applies To Both Congregational and Hierarchical Churches

Posted on April 09, 2010
In Ad Hoc Committee of Parishioners of Our Lady of the Son Catholic Church, Inc. v. Reiss, (AZ App., Feb. 23, 2010), an Arizona appellate court held that the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine applies to congregational churches in the same way that it applies to hierarchical ones...

First Shariah-Compliant Space Satellite Insurance Policy Is Written

Posted on April 08, 2010
Yahsat, a satellite communications company owned by the government of Abu Dhabi, has broken new ground by purchasing a Shariah-compliant insurance policy as part of the insurance package on the two satellites it plans to launch in 2011. Space News reported yesterday that the policy supplements two larger conventional policies previously acquired...

Possibility In Offing of Supreme Court Without Protestant Justices

Posted on April 08, 2010
NPR yesterday reported that with the anticipated retirement this year of U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, the country for the first time may have a Supreme Court with no Protestant Justices. The two leading candidates to replace Stevens-- U...

Kenyan Religious Leaders Oppose New Draft Constitution

Posted on April 08, 2010
In Kenya, Cardinal John Njue of Nairobi, chairman of the Kenyan bishops' conference, and Rev. Peter Karanja , general secretary of the National Council of Churches say they will mobilize Christians to vote against Kenya's new draft constitution in the June referendum on it...

Vaccination Objection Held To Be Sincere, But Not Religious

Posted on April 08, 2010
In Caviezel v. Great Neck Public Schools, (ED NY, April 5, 2010), a New York federal district court refused to grant a preliminary injunction to force the Great Neck school system to grant plaintiffs an exemption from the requirement their child be vaccinated in order to enroll...

Ministerial Exception Precludes Wage and Hour Suit Against Scientology

Posted on April 08, 2010
In Headley v. Church of Scientology International, (CD CA, April 2, 2010), a California federal district court dismissed a claim by a Church of Scientology staff member that the Church violated state and federal labor laws. The court said:Here, even if Plaintiff could establish the alleged federal and state labor law violations, there is no dispute that she: (1) was employed by a religious institution; (2) was chosen for her position based largely on religious criteria; and (3) performed religious duties and responsibilities...

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