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FULTON v. PHILADELPHIA 

ALITO, J., concurring in judgment
ALITO, J., concurring in judgment 

404 (1989).

None of these obstacles stopped the Smith majority from
adopting its new rule and displacing decades of precedent. 
The majority feared that continued adherence to that case 
law would “cour[t] anarchy” because it “would open the pro-
spect of constitutionally required religious exemptions from 
civic  obligations  of  almost  every  conceivable  kind.”    494 
U. S., at 888.  The majority recognized that its new inter-
pretation would place small religious groups at a “relative
disadvantage,” but the majority found that preferable to the
problems  it  envisioned  if  the  Sherbert  test  had  been  re-
tained.  494 U. S., at 890. 

Four Justices emphatically disagreed with Smith’s rein-
terpretation of the Free Exercise Clause.  Justice O’Connor 
wrote that this new reading “dramatically depart[ed] from 
well-settled First Amendment jurisprudence” and was “in-
compatible with our Nation’s fundamental commitment to 
individual religious liberty.”  494 U. S., at 891 (opinion con-
curring  in  judgment).    Justices  Brennan,  Marshall,  and 
Blackmun  protested  that  the  majority  had  “mischarac-
teriz[ed]” and “discard[ed]” the Court’s free-exercise juris-
prudence on its way to “perfunctorily dismiss[ing]” the “set-
tled  and  inviolate  principle”  that  state  laws  burdening
religious freedom may stand only if “justified by a compel-
ling  interest  that  cannot  be  served  by  less  restrictive
means.”  Id., at 907–908 (Blackmun, J., joined by Brennan 
and Marshall, JJ., dissenting). 

Smith’s impact was quickly felt, and Congress was inun-
dated with reports of the decision’s consequences.26  In re-
sponse,  it  attempted  to  restore  the  Sherbert  test.  In  the 

—————— 

26 A particularly heartbreaking example was a case in which a judge 
felt compelled by Smith to reverse his previous decision holding the state 
medical examiner liable for performing the autopsy of a young Hmong 
man  who  had  been  killed  in  a  car  accident.    The  young  man’s  parents 
were tortured by the thought that the autopsy would prevent their son