Trinity Lutheran Church v. Comer, Director, Missouri Department of Natural Resources
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 26, 2017 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Decided
- June 26, 2017
- Term
- October Term 2016
- Vote
- 7–2
- Majority author
- Justice Roberts
- Issue area
- First Amendment
- Disposition
- Reversed and remanded
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
- Constitutional ruling
- State/territorial law held unconstitutional
Opinion excerpt
We granted certiorari sub nom. Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Inc. v. Pauley, 577 U.S. ----, 136 S.Ct. 891, 193 L.Ed.2d 784 (2016), and now reverse. II The First Amendment provides, in part, that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." The parties agree that the Establishment Clause of that Amendment does not prevent Missouri from including Trinity Lutheran in the Scrap Tire Program. That does not, however, answer the question under the Free Exercise Clause, because we have recognized that there is "play in the joints" between what the Establishment Clause permits and the Free Exercise Clause compels. Locke, 540 U.S., at 718, 124 S.Ct. 1307 (internal quotation marks omitted). The Free Exercise Clause "protect[s] religious observers against unequal treatment" and subjects to the strictest scrutiny laws that target the religious for "special disabilities" based on their "religious status." Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. Hialeah, 508 U.S. 520, 533, 542, 113 S.Ct. 2217, 124 L.Ed.2d 472 (1993) (internal quotation marks omitted). Applying that basic principle, this Court has repeatedly confirmed that denying a generally available benefit solely on account of religious identity imposes a penalty on the free exercise of religion that can be justified only by a state interest "of the highest order."…
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