{"id":7292,"date":"2022-02-21T17:35:37","date_gmt":"2022-02-21T17:35:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=7292"},"modified":"2022-02-21T17:35:37","modified_gmt":"2022-02-21T17:35:37","slug":"the-supreme-court-is-leading-a-christian-conservative-revolution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=7292","title":{"rendered":"The Supreme Court is leading a Christian conservative revolution"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\n“Justice Amy Coney Barrett had been a member of the Supreme Court for less than a month when she cast the key vote in one of the most consequential religion cases of the past century<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Months earlier, when the seat she would fill was still held by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Court had handed down a series of 5-4 decisions establishing that churches and other houses of worship must comply with state occupancy limits<\/a> and other rules imposed upon them to slow the spread of Covid-19.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Chief Justice John Roberts, the only Republican appointee to join these decisions, explained in South Bay United Pentecostal Church v. Newsom<\/em><\/a> (2020), \u201cour Constitution principally entrusts \u2018[t]he safety and the health of the people\u2019 to the politically accountable officials of the States.\u201d And these officials\u2019 decisions \u201cshould not be subject to second-guessing by an \u2018unelected federal judiciary,\u2019 which lacks the background, competence, and expertise to assess public health and is not accountable to the people.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But this sort of judicial humility no longer enjoyed majority support on the Court once Barrett\u2019s confirmation gave GOP justices a 6-3 supermajority. Twenty-nine days after Barrett became Justice Barrett, she united with her fellow Trump appointees and two other hardline conservative justices in Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. Cuomo<\/em><\/a> (2020), a decision striking down the very sort of occupancy limits that the Court permitted in South Bay<\/em>. The upshot of this decision is that the public\u2019s interest in controlling a deadly disease must give way to the wishes of certain religious litigants.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Before Roman Catholic Diocese<\/em>, religious objectors typically had to follow a \u201cneutral law of general applicability\u201d \u2014 meaning that these objectors must obey the same laws that everyone else must follow. Roman Catholic Diocese<\/em> technically did not abolish this rule, but it redefined what constitutes a \u201cneutral law of general applicability\u201d so narrowly that nearly any religious conservative with a clever lawyer can expect to prevail in a lawsuit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That decision is part of a much bigger pattern. Since the Court\u2019s Republican majority became a supermajority, the Court has treated religion cases as its highest priority.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Several of the justices are openly hostile to the very idea that the Constitution imposes limits on the government\u2019s ability to advance one faith over others. At a recent oral argument, for example, Justice Neil Gorsuch derisively referred to the \u201cso-called separation of . . . church and state<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Indeed, it appears likely that the Court may even require the government to subsidize religion, at least in certain circumstances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At December\u2019s oral arguments in Carson v. Makin<\/em><\/a>, for example, the Court considered a Maine program that provides tuition vouchers to some students, which they can use to pay for education at a secular private school when there\u2019s no public school nearby. Though the state says it wishes to remain \u201cneutral and silent\u201d on matters of religion and not allow its vouchers to go to private religious schools, many of the justices appeared to view this kind of neutrality as unlawful. \u201cDiscriminating against all religions,\u201d Justice Brett Kavanaugh suggested, is itself a form of anti-religious discrimination that violates his conception of the Constitution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For many decades, the Court held the opposite view. As the Court held in Everson v. Board of Education<\/em><\/a>(1947), \u201cno tax in any amount, large or small, can be levied to support any religious activities or institutions, whatever they may be called, or whatever form they may adopt to teach or practice religion.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Everson<\/em>\u2019s rule is now dead<\/a>. And the Court appears likely to require secular taxpayers to pay for religious education, at least under some circumstances.”  
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.vox.com\/22889417\/supreme-court-religious-liberty-christian-right-revolution-amy-coney-barrett<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Justice Amy Coney Barrett had been a member of the Supreme Court for less than a month when she cast the key vote in one of the most consequential religion cases of the past century.
\nMonths earlier, when the seat she would fill was still held by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Court had handed down a series of 5-4 decisions establishing that churches and other houses of worship must comply with state occupancy limits and other rules imposed upon them to slow the spread of Covid-19.<\/p>\n

As Chief Justice John Roberts, the only Republican appointee to join these decisions, explained in South Bay United Pentecostal Church v. Newsom (2020), \u201cour Constitution principally entrusts \u2018[t]he safety and the health of the people\u2019 to the politically accountable officials of the States.\u201d And these officials\u2019 decisions \u201cshould not be subject to second-guessing by an \u2018unelected federal judiciary,\u2019 which lacks the background, competence, and expertise to assess public health and is not accountable to the people.\u201d<\/p>\n

But this sort of judicial humility no longer enjoyed majority support on the Court once Barrett\u2019s confirmation gave GOP justices a 6-3 supermajority. Twenty-nine days after Barrett became Justice Barrett, she united with her fellow Trump appointees and two other hardline conservative justices in Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. Cuomo (2020), a decision striking down the very sort of occupancy limits that the Court permitted in South Bay. The upshot of this decision is that the public\u2019s interest in controlling a deadly disease must give way to the wishes of certain religious litigants.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“Before Roman Catholic Diocese, religious objectors typically had to follow a \u201cneutral law of general applicability\u201d \u2014 meaning that these objectors must obey the same laws that everyone else must follow. Roman Catholic Diocese technically did not abolish this rule, but it redefined what constitutes a \u201cneutral law of general applicability\u201d so narrowly that nearly any religious conservative with a clever lawyer can expect to prevail in a lawsuit.<\/p>\n

That decision is part of a much bigger pattern. Since the Court\u2019s Republican majority became a supermajority, the Court has treated religion cases as its highest priority.” <\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“Several of the justices are openly hostile to the very idea that the Constitution imposes limits on the government\u2019s ability to advance one faith over others. At a recent oral argument, for example, Justice Neil Gorsuch derisively referred to the \u201cso-called separation of . . . church and state.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indeed, it appears likely that the Court may even require the government to subsidize religion, at least in certain circumstances.<\/p>\n

At December\u2019s oral arguments in Carson v. Makin, for example, the Court considered a Maine program that provides tuition vouchers to some students, which they can use to pay for education at a secular private school when there\u2019s no public school nearby. Though the state says it wishes to remain \u201cneutral and silent\u201d on matters of religion and not allow its vouchers to go to private religious schools, many of the justices appeared to view this kind of neutrality as unlawful. \u201cDiscriminating against all religions,\u201d Justice Brett Kavanaugh suggested, is itself a form of anti-religious discrimination that violates his conception of the Constitution.<\/p>\n

For many decades, the Court held the opposite view. As the Court held in Everson v. Board of Education (1947), \u201cno tax in any amount, large or small, can be levied to support any religious activities or institutions, whatever they may be called, or whatever form they may adopt to teach or practice religion.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Everson\u2019s rule is now dead. And the Court appears likely to require secular taxpayers to pay for religious education, at least under some circumstances.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[60,1338,1213,528],"class_list":["post-7292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article-share","tag-christianity","tag-conservatism","tag-judiciary","tag-supreme-court"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7292"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7292\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7293,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7292\/revisions\/7293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}