Opinion ID: 2639069
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Hybrid rights

Text: As an additional argument for applying strict scrutiny to its federal free exercise claim, Catholic Charities argues that the WCEA violates so-called hybrid rights. The term hybrid rights is loosely derived from Smith, supra, 494 U.S. 872, 110 S.Ct. 1595, in which the high court repudiated the strict scrutiny test of Sherbert, 374 U.S. 398, 83 S.Ct. 1790. (See Smith, at pp. 882-884, 110 S.Ct. 1595.) Along the way to that conclusion, the court distinguished certain of its prior decisions as having involved not just the free exercise clause but other constitutional provisions as well. Specifically, the court stated that [t]he only decisions in which we have held that the First Amendment bars application of a neutral, generally applicable law to religiously motivated 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 [12] ..., OR THE RIGHT OF PARENts ... to direct the education of their children [13] .... ( Id., at p. 881, 110 S.Ct. 1595.) The facts of Smith, the court observed, did not present such a hybrid situation, but a free exercise claim unconnected with any communicative activity or parental right. ( Smith, at p. 882, 110 S.Ct. 1595.) Relying on this passage from Smith, supra, 494 U.S. 872, 110 S.Ct. 1595, Catholic Charities argues the WCEA violates hybrid rights and, thus, requires us to apply strict scrutiny to its free exercise claim. The other rights violated, Catholic Charities asserts, are those protected by the free speech and establishment clauses of the First Amendment. (U.S. Const., 1st Amend.) The high court has not, since the decision in Smith, supra, 494 U.S. 872, 110 S.Ct. 1595, determined whether the hybrid rights theory is valid or invoked it to justify applying strict scrutiny to a free exercise claim. Justice Souter has mentioned hybrid rights in a concurring opinion, but only to criticize Smith's reliance on the concept. ( Lukumi, supra, 508 U.S. 520, 567, 113 S.Ct. 2217 (opn. of Souter, J., conc. in part).) Some of the lower federal courts have treated the relevant passage from Smith as dictum and declined to apply, to assertedly hybrid claims, a standard stricter than the rational basis test. ( Leebaert v. Harrington (2d Cir.2003) 332 F.3d 134, 143-144; Kissinger v. Board of Trustees (6th Cir.1993) 5 F.3d 177, 180.) Other lower federal courts appear to have assumed that hybrid claims trigger a higher level of scrutiny, but have concluded that a plaintiff does not allege a hybrid-rights claim entitled to strict scrutiny analysis merely by combining a free exercise claim with an utterly meritless claim of the violation of another alleged fundamental right. ( Miller v. Reed (9th Cir.1999) 176 F.3d 1202, 1208; see also Civil Lib. for Urban Believers v. City of Chicago (7th Cir.2003) 342 F.3d 752, 765; Swanson By and Through Swanson v. Guthrie ISD I-L (10th Cir.1998) 135 F.3d 694, 700.) Catholic Charities argues that the non-free-exercise component of a hybrid claim need only be colorable and not ultimately meritorious. While some courts have proposed such a rule (e.g., Miller v. Reed, supra, 176 F.3d 1202, 1207; Swanson By and Through Swanson v. Guthrie ISD I-L, supra, 135 F.3d 694, 700), no court has relied on it to grant relief. Nor would such a rule make sense. As Justice Souter has explained, [i]f a hybrid claim is simply one in which another constitutional right is implicated, then the hybrid exception would probably be so vast as to swallow the Smith rule.... ( Lukumi, supra, 508 U.S. 520, 567, 113 S.Ct. 2217 (opn. of Souter, J., conc. in part).) For this reason, the Sixth Circuit has rejected as completely illogical the proposition that the legal standard [of review] under the Free Exercise Clause depends on whether a free-exercise claim is coupled with other constitutional rights. ( Kissinger v. Board of Trustees, supra, 5 F.3d 177, 180 & fn. 1.) We are aware of no decision in which a federal court has actually relied solely on the hybrid rights theory to justify applying strict scrutiny to a free exercise claim. Indeed, the only federal decision that can properly be said to have relied on the theory at all is E.E.O.C. v. Catholic University of America, supra, 83 F.3d 455, 467, in which the court mentioned hybrid rights as an alternative basis for its conclusion that federal employment law could not be applied to require a Catholic educational institution to grant tenure to a professor of canon law. The principal basis for the court's holding was the ministerial exception. ( Id., at pp. 463-465; see ante, 10 Cal.Rptr.3d at p. 296, 85 P.3d at p. 78 et seq.) [14] Assuming for the sake of argument the hybrid rights theory is not merely a misreading of Smith, supra, 494 U.S. 872, 110 S.Ct. 1595, Catholic Charities has not alleged a meritorious constitutional claim that might justify the theory's application to this case. Catholic Charities argues that to assist in providing employees with insurance for prescription contraceptives would be viewed as an endorsement of their use and that the WCEA, by compelling such assistance, violates the free speech clause by requiring the organization to engage in symbolic speech it finds objectionable. The argument lacks merit. Certainly the First Amendment may prevent the government from compelling individuals to express certain views.... ( United States v. United Foods, Inc. (2001) 533 U.S. 405, 410, 121 S.Ct. 2334, 150 L.Ed.2d 438, citing Wooley v. Maynard (1977) 430 U.S. 705, 713-717, 97 S.Ct. 1428, 51 L.Ed.2d 752 [state may not compel unwilling motorists to display state motto, Live Free or Die, on vehicle license plates], and Board of Education v. Barnette (1943) 319 U.S. 624, 630-642, 63 S.Ct. 1178, 87 L.Ed. 1628 [state may not compel public school pupils to salute the flag or recite the Pledge of Allegiance].) However, Catholic Charities' compliance with a law regulating health care benefits is not speech. The law leaves Catholic Charities free to express its disapproval of prescription contraceptives and to encourage its employees not to use them. For purposes of the free speech clause, simple obedience to a law that does not require one to convey a verbal or symbolic message cannot reasonably be seen a statement of support for the law or its purpose. Such a rule would, in effect, permit each individual to choose which laws he would obey merely by declaring his agreement or opposition. (Cf. Buhl v. Hannigan (1993) 16 Cal.App.4th 1612, 1626 & fn. 11, 20 Cal.Rptr.2d 740 [dismissing as ludicrous a motorcyclist's claim that compliance with a law requiring the wearing of helmets in effect compelled speech supporting the law, regardless of the motivation for noncompliance].) [15]