Three members of court do not a majority make.
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No, they don’t, but we don’t know how far two of the other three are willing to go and this decision doesn’t offer any guidance. Again, as the author notes, the recent trend is clear, the only question is how much deference the Court will grant to religious freedom.
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BINGO - and there you have one of the giant boulders standing in the way of any GOP support for a methodical & in-depth investigation of the January 6th insurrection … they know who was complicit, who aided and abetted … and who actively assisted … by sharing critical information with those plotting the attempted coup.
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Republicans are living proof that Democrats are much smarter.
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The metaphor of carefree GOPer-pols in the face of a coming deluge of charges is logical if one assumes
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mind-numbing sycophancy on the part of minions, pols and operatives
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an illogical assumtion of a rescue from a defeated ex-president
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an authoritarian tendency of Republicans to assume the personality of the person being worshiped
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Trump is not the only person reading from the Roy Cohn playbook
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How, indeed?
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More like they never should have had tax exemption to begin with. It literally requires a government recognition of what are religions, in violation of the first amendments first goddamn line: ‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion’
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Black Forest ham, specifically.
https://www.bar-s.com/food-for-thought/learn-your-deli-meats!-a-brief-history-of-black-forest-ham-and-other-favorites
“Look bad”?? Sometimes black skin looks most beautiful, not spoiled or cursed.
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Happily we are living in the era of the great dismantling of the Catholic Church in America. Their continued sexual depravity and decades-long abuse of children has cost them hundreds of millions with no end in sight. Older congregants die off each day, and are not being replaced by younger people who find the church abhorrent.
Sit back and let these demons finish themself off, and I say this as a confirmed Catholic.
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Yup, as a gay citizen, I have proclaimed long and hard that inexplicably allowing “trans” under our umbrella would prevent gay and lesbian people from equality legislation which it has.
This is especially difficult because straight, white “progressives” have decided the badge of progressivism sine qua non, is the adoption of the demands of the Gender Identity Movement, something which I feel at its core is unscientific, homophobic and misogynistic.
In my mind, the larger question is what establishes the definition of a “religion”. Think about it. The sky is the limit on what people, and groups of people will choose to believe, all in the name of making themselves feel better. How many religions are deemed cults in the name of whatever deity they choose to believe? What establishes the difference between a cult and a religion? If my religion is opposed to paying taxes, i should therefore be granted a religious exemption from paying into a system that violates my religious beliefs. That’s what Hobby Lobby was all about. If we keep allowing religious beliefs to exceed to the rule of law that apply to the rest of us, what then is the value of a government who’s existence is based on rules of law? At what point, then, do we begin basing our laws on religious beliefs because not doing so violates the religious beliefs of our elected lawmakers? This is an extremely slippery slope. Personal religious beliefs cannot be allowed to outweigh the common good and the welfare and security and the pursuit of liberty of the whole. Exceptions to the rule make those rules meaningless, and presto! We have no nation of laws because they all violate someone’s religion.
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Let’s all be big for a change.
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Welp can being gay be a religion then? I am being only partly snarky here. Some believe being gay is a “choice” (I don’t agree with that idea). Certainly being a Christian is a choice.
The slope is certainly a slippery one.
One other thought… John Roberts always looks so self satisfied with the cheesy grin (or smirk as the case may be).
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We really need to get the language right on this. It’s really “The expansion of religious privilege”.
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Justice Ginsburg raised similar questions in her dissent:
Suppose an employer’s sincerely held religious belief is offended by health coverage of vaccines, or paying the minimum wage, or according women equal pay for substantially similar work,
The Supreme Court, by deciding which cases it will hear. Ginsburg again:
Would the exemption the Court holds RFRA demands for employers with religiously grounded objections to the use of certain contraceptives extend to employers with religiously grounded objections to blood transfusions (Jehovah’s Witnesses); antidepressants (Scientologists); medications derived from pigs, including anesthesia, intravenous fluids, and pills coated with gelatin (certain Muslims, Jews, and Hindus); and vaccinations (Christian Scientists, among others)? . . . The Court, however, sees nothing to worry about. Today’s cases, the Court concludes, are “concerned solely with the contraceptive mandate. Our decision should not be understood to hold that an insurance-coverage mandate must necessarily fall if it conflicts with an employer’s religious beliefs. Other coverage requirements, such as immunizations, may be supported by different interests (for example, the need to combat the spread of infectious diseases) and may involve different arguments about the least restrictive means of providing them.”
She was dead-on right in her conclusion: “The Court, I fear, has ventured into a minefield.” Unless you subscribe to the same brand of religious dogma as a majority of the Court. In that case, all is good.
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This was a very minor win. Not sure why the court even took it.
If the City moves to having solid non-discrimination rules that are simply not subject to accommodations for anyone, the Church is SOL.
Alito even dissented, “This decision might as well be written on the dissolving paper sold in magic shops.”
You know what the irony in all of this is? The controlling decision here - Smith - holds that religions don’t get a special exemption from generally applicable, neutral laws, as long as those laws weren’t intended to discriminate against religion. Conservatives now hate this decision because it means they can’t get special exemptions to be bigots. And you know who wrote the Smith decision?
Antonin Scalia.
(There is more irony because liberals hated the Smith decision when it came out because the losers were Native Americans who wanted to smoke peyote. Now they love it. Never thought I’d miss
Scalia, but he had more integrity (he also voted to allow flag burning) then a lot of the current crop of conservative judges).
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The righties standard response to anyone who is being discriminated in their workplace or in any business is to go elsewhere. OK, let’s turn that around. If the Catholics do not want to place foster children in same sex households, get out of the business of placing foster children. do something else that does not offend their so called “religious liberty”.
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Nobody says that the business owner cannot be armed. It is a stand your ground situation. Blast away if anyone tries to come in your door armed.