Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/19-123_g3bi.pdf
Page Number: 47.0

Cite as:  593 U. S. ____ (2021) 

25 

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

If we put these definitions together, the ordinary mean-
ing  of  “prohibiting  the  free  exercise  of  religion”  was  (and
still is) forbidding or hindering unrestrained religious prac-
tices or worship.  That straightforward understanding is a
far  cry  from  the  interpretation  adopted  in  Smith.  It  cer-
tainly does not suggest a distinction between laws that are
generally applicable and laws that are targeted. 

As interpreted in Smith, the Clause is essentially an anti-
discrimination  provision:  It  means  that  the  Federal  Gov-
ernment and the States cannot restrict conduct that consti-
tutes a religious practice for some people unless it imposes 
the  same  restriction  on  everyone  else  who  engages  in  the 
same conduct.  Smith made no real attempt to square that 
equal-treatment interpretation with the ordinary meaning 
of the Free Exercise Clause’s language, and it is hard to see 
how that could be done. 

The key point for present purposes is that the text of the
Free Exercise Clause gives a specific group of people (those 
who wish to engage in the “exercise of religion”) the right to
do so without hindrance.  The language of the Clause does
not  tie  this  right  to  the  treatment  of  persons  not  in  this 
group.

The oddity of Smith’s interpretation can be illustrated by
considering  what  the  same  sort  of  interpretation  would
mean  if  applied  to  other  provisions  of  the  Bill  of  Rights. 
Take the Sixth Amendment, which gives a specified group
of people (the “accused” in criminal cases) a particular right
(the right to the “Assistance of Counsel for [their] defence”). 
Suppose that Congress or a state legislature adopted a law 
banning counsel in all litigation, civil and criminal.  Would 
anyone doubt that this law would violate the Sixth Amend-
ment rights of criminal defendants? 

Or consider the Seventh Amendment, which gives a spec-
ified group of people (parties in most civil “Suits at common 
law”) “the right of trial by jury.”  Would there be any ques-