Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/21-418_i425.pdf
Page Number: 39

2 

KENNEDY v. BREMERTON SCHOOL DIST. 

THOMAS, J., concurring 

“tradition” of the Free Exercise Clause.  Borough of Duryea 
v. Guarnieri, 564 U. S. 379, 406 (2011) (Scalia, J., concur-
ring in judgment in part and dissenting in part); see also 
id., at 400 (THOMAS, J., concurring in judgment). 

Second, the Court also does not decide what burden a gov-
ernment  employer  must  shoulder  to  justify  restricting  an 
employee’s religious expression because the District had no 
constitutional basis for reprimanding Kennedy under any 
possibly  applicable  standard  of  scrutiny.  See  ante,  at  20. 
While we have many public-employee precedents address-
ing how the interest-balancing test set out in Pickering v. 
Board of Ed. of Township High School Dist. 205, Will Cty., 
391 U. S. 563 (1968), applies under the Free Speech Clause, 
the Court has never before applied Pickering balancing to a 
claim brought under the Free Exercise Clause.  A govern-
ment  employer’s  burden  therefore  might  differ  depending 
on which First Amendment guarantee a public employee in-
vokes.