Opinion ID: 1779062
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 10

Heading: Employment Division Department of Human Resources of Oregon v. Smith

Text: ś 54. The United States Supreme Court shifted its concentration from the quality of the religious belief to the nature of the restriction in Employment Division Department of Human Resources of Oregon v. Smith, 494 U.S. 872, 110 S.Ct. 1595, 108 L.Ed.2d 876 (1990). [12] In that case, members of the Native American Church were denied employment benefits after being discharged from employment for ingesting the hallucinogenic drug, peyote, which was in violation of Oregon law. The Court began its analysis by recognizing that the Free Exercise Clause would prohibit any statute or law from banning religious practices only when they are engaged in for religious reasons, or only because of the religious belief that they display. 494 U.S. at 877, 110 S.Ct. 1595. The same cannot be said, however, where the statute or law is not specifically directed at [the] religious practice, and the law or statute is constitutional as applied to non-religious conduct. Id. at 878, 110 S.Ct. 1595. The Court then provided the following guidance which is of great assistance in reaching our decision in the case sub judice: They contend that their religious motivation for using peyote places them beyond the reach of a criminal law that is not specifically directed at their religious practice, and that is concededly constitutional as applied to those who use the drug for other reasons. They assert, in other words, that prohibiting the free exercise [of religion] includes requiring any individual to observe a generally applicable law that requires (or forbids) the performance of an act that his religious belief forbids (or requires). As a textual matter, we do not think the words must be given that meaning. It is no more necessary to regard the collection of a general tax, for example, as prohibiting the free exercise [of religion] by those citizens who believe support of organized government to be sinful, than it is to regard the same tax as abridging the freedom . . . of the press of those publishing companies that must pay the tax as a condition of staying in business. It is a permissible reading of the text, in the one case as in the other, to say that if prohibiting the exercise of religion (or burdening the activity of printing) is not the object of the tax but merely the incidental effect of a generally applicable and otherwise valid provision, the First Amendment has not been offended. (citations omitted) Our decisions reveal that the latter reading is the correct one. We have never held that an individual's religious beliefs excuse him from compliance with an otherwise valid law prohibiting conduct that the State is free to regulate. On the contrary, the record of more than a century of our free exercise jurisprudence contradicts that proposition. As described succinctly by Justice Frankfurter in Minersville School Dist. Bd of Ed. v. Gobitis, 310 U.S. 586, 594-595, 60 S.Ct. 1010, 1012-1013, 84 L.Ed. 1375 (1940): Conscientious scruples have not, in the course of the long struggle for religious toleration, relieved the individual from obedience to a general law not aimed at the promotion or restriction of religious beliefs. The mere possession of religious convictions which contradict the relevant concerns of a political society does not relieve the citizen from the discharge of political responsibilities (footnote omitted). 494 U.S. at 878-79, 110 S.Ct. 1595. ś 55. The Court did, of course, refuse to apply Wisconsin's generally applicable statute requiring school attendance to Amish children on religious grounds. (See discussion of Yoder, supra.) This seeming conflict is resolved to the Employment Division Court's satisfaction by its pointing out: The only decisions in which we have held that the First Amendment bars application of a neutral, generally applicable law to religiously motivate action have involved not the Free Exercise Clause alone, but the Free Exercise Clause in conjunction with other constitutional protections, such as freedom of speech and of the press . . . (citations omitted), or the right of parents, acknowledged in Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U.S. 510, 45 S.Ct. 571, 69 L.Ed. 1070 (1925), to direct the education of their children, see Wisconsin v. Yoder , (citation omitted) (invalidating compulsory school-attendance laws as applied to Amish parents who refused on religious grounds to send their children to school). Employment Division, 494 U.S. at 881, 110 S.Ct. 1595. The previous quoted language from Employment Division is footnoted with the following: Yoder said that the the Court's holding in Pierce stands as a charter to the rights of parents to direct the religious upbringing of their children. And, when the interests of parenthood are combined with a free exercise claim of the nature revealed by this record, more than merely a `reasonable relation to some purpose within the competency of the State' is required to sustain the validity of the State's requirement under the First Amendment. 406 U.S., at 233, 92 S.Ct., at 1542. Employment Division, 494 U.S. at 882 n. 1, 110 S.Ct. 1595. ś 56. The respondents in Employment Division urged the Court to accept that regulation of their conduct would also serve to regulate their religious convictions. [13] The Court rejected this contention, stating, We have never held that, and decline to do so now. There being no contention that Oregon's drug law represents an attempt to regulate religious beliefs, the communication of religious beliefs, or the raising of one's children in those beliefs, the rule to which we have adhered ever since Reynolds [ v. U.S., 98 U.S. 145, 25 L.Ed. 244 (1879)] plainly controls. 494 U.S. at 882, 110 S.Ct. 1595. ś 57. The Diocese in the case sub judice would have us accept that subjecting it to prosecution of civil claims for negligent supervision would be tantamount to attempting to regulate its ecclesiastical policies, principles and procedures. However, as in Employment Division, there is no contention that Mississippi's tort law represents an attempt to regulate the ecclesiastical beliefs, policies or principles held by the Diocese, or the communication of those beliefs, policies or principles, or the training and nurturing of priests in those beliefs, policies or principles. ś 58. We read Employment Division to hold that valid, neutral laws which regulate conduct the State is free to regulate will be upheld against all institutions, including those of a religious nature.