Muslims, Monasteries, Jews, Sikhs, Scholars Urge SCOTUS to Hear Landmark Religious Liberty Appeal

Becket Fund ^ | May 3, 2013

[NYer]

Diverse Group of Amicus Briefs Ask the High Court to Protect a Peaceful Hutterite Colony

For Immediate Release: May 3, 2013
Media Contact: Emily Hardman, ehardman@becketfund.org, 202.349.7224

Washington, D.C. – Yesterday, the State of Michigan, twenty-one First Amendment scholars, and eighteen religious organizations representing tens of millions of religious believers filed friend-of-the-court briefs with the U.S. Supreme Court, urging the Court to hear a religious liberty appeal on behalf of a Hutterite colony in Montana. The question in the case is whether the Hutterites, who trace their history to the Protestant Reformation in the 1500s, can be forced to provide workers’ compensation insurance to their members, in violation of almost 500 years of Hutterite religious teaching.

The six amicus briefs were filed on behalf of a diverse array of religious organizations—including Muslims, Jews, Sikhs, Santeros, Seventh-day Adventists, Hare Krishnas, Catholics, and Evangelicals. The religious groups were also joined by the State of Michigan and twenty-one First Amendment scholars.

“This incredible show of support from a diverse array of organizations and scholars speaks volumes about the importance of this case and injustice done to the Hutterites,” said Luke Goodrich, Deputy General Counsel for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty and counsel on the Hutterite case.

Highlights from the briefs include:

• “The State here demands something that is not possible, that is, something that is not possible without first destroying what it means to be Hutterite.” – Brief of 21 Constitutional scholars including: Michael McConnell, Robert P. George, Richard Garnett, Thomas Berg, Carl Esbeck, Teresa Stanton Collett, Richard Duncan, and Michael Stokes Paulsen

• “The Hutterites, though small in number, raise in their petition a constitutional question that affects millions of religious minorities.” – Brief of the American Islamic Congress

• “[S]tates across the country already recognize that imposing workers’ compensation on religious organizations raises First Amendment issues. For that reason, a number of states have statutes excluding either religious organizations or people working for religious organizations without pay[.]” – Brief of the State of Michigan

• “[T]he decision below essentially deprives monasteries of the resources necessary to sustain themselves and support their charitable ministries…In the absence of the financial gain derived from the sale of these goods and services to nonmembers, it would be virtually impossible for a monastery to support itself and freely serve the needy.” Brief of Monasteries Belmont Abbey and the Abbey of New Clairvaux

• “[A] religious practice may be just as burdened by a lawmaker who does not care about religious freedom, as by one who exudes conscious religious bias.” – Brief of Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, National Association of Evangelicals, Seventh-Day Adventists, Southern Baptist Convention, National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, and Christian Legal Society

• “[The decision] threatens to dismantle the protections for minority religious groups that this Court recognized in Smith and Lukumi. In doing so, it allows majoritarian forces and well-organized special interests to infringe, even if inadvertently, on the basic freedoms of religious minorities.” – Brief of Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye, International Society for Krishna Consciousness, O Centro, and Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund

The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty is a non-profit, public-interest law firm dedicated to protecting the free expression of all religious traditions—from Anglicans to Zoroastrians. For 18 years its attorneys have been recognized as experts in the field of church-state law. The Becket Fund recently won a 9-0 victory in Hosanna-Tabor v. EEOC, which The Wall Street Journal called one of “the most important religious liberty cases in a half century.”

For more information, or to arrange an interview with one of the attorneys, please contact Emily Hardman, Communications Director, at ehardman@becketfund.org or call 202.349.7224.

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Additional Information:

Resources:

• Case Page (images, legal documents, and additional resources)
• Media Information Sheet

Legal Documents:

• Becket Fund’s Cert Petition to the U.S. Supreme Court
• Becket Fund’s Cert Petition Appendix to the U.S. Supreme Court
• Montana Supreme Court Opinion
• District Court Opinion

Amicus Briefs:

• Brief of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, et. al.
• Brief of 21 Scholars
• Brief of the American Islamic Congress
• Brief of the State of Michigan
• Brief for The Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye, et. al.
• Brief of Belmont Abbey and the Abbey of New Clairvaux

Previous Press Releases:

• Supreme Court Asked to Weigh in on Religious Group’s Right to Live Communally (April 2, 2013)

[NYer]

Catholic Ping
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[Mrs. Don-o]

God bless the Becket Fund. I have just decided that ALL of my Catholic charitable giving (measly as it is) will be given to such groups, and not to any ecclesiastical entity.

Not that my parish and diocese don't deserve it, they do indeed, but I serve them in other ways; and with the little bit of money I have, I want to make sure the impact is maximum.

[Mrs. Don-o]

P.S. The Hutterites (or Hutterian Brethren) are about as far away from Catholics as you can get on the "Christian ecclesial spectrum," and yet I feel very close to them. They are Christians, farmers, close in spirit to the Amish, except they are communal. (I stress "of course voluntarily" to stave off any untoward comments about communism.)

They intend harm to no one, speak harm to no one; do harm to no one; and if that isn't enough to guarantee them peace from the authorities then there's something damned perverse about the authorities. I am thrilled that Becket is defending them.

[NYer]

They are Christians, farmers, close in spirit to the Amish, except they are communal.

An interesting group. While working at the NYS Capitol, occasionally a group of Amish? (perhaps Mennonites) would take their children on tour. The young boys would stand in front of the elevator, wide eyed and gaping in wonderment as they watched it go up and down. The girls were dressed in pastel colors with white bonnets and the boys wore the black pants with blue shirts and straw hats. They did not seem to realize that, in and of themselves, they were the star attraction for us.

I am thrilled that Becket is defending them.

Ditto. The Becket Fund is also defending Hobby Lobby.

[cdcdawg]

If the SCOTUS hears it, Scalia will be a very interesting one to watch. The last time this issue came up directly, I don’t think Thomas was on the Court yet. I assume Roberts will work extra hard to find a way for the government to win.

[RedMDer]

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[Mamzelle]

Those are sure some adorable children. Can someone tell me about Hutterites?

[Mrs. Don-o]

The only ones I've met were men who worked for a (Catholic) parish friend of mine, in his woodworking business. That is unusual, because they almost always work for other Hutterites, but in this case there was some kind of big need for cash money in their community so they got woodworking jobs. Sam said they were excellent workers, the best he's had.

It seems they are somewhere between Amish and Mennonite in their lifestyle. The girls and women wear midlength skirts and long-sleeved blouses or long jumper-type dresses, but with more varied, pretty colors; the men can wear regular jeans or overalls; they ride buses and ride bicycles; I don't know about power farm equipment, but they did know all about power woodworking tools.

And they live communally. There might be 10 or 15 families in a community, they build multi-unit housing (duplex style) and are regular monogamous nuclear families but raise and educate their kids together. Within the community they do not have private property (land, houses, etc), though some may own personal things, (clothes, tools, I think.) They have communal meals, or at least communal supper.

There's a bunch of info about the Hutterian Brethren. on the Internet.

[Mamzelle]

Thanks,

[1010RD]

Excellent and all people of faith need to band together on these and other religious liberty issues. If you want to kill the welfare state, it will be churches that do it via religious freedom. I hope they win.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks NYer.

Diverse Group of Amicus Briefs Ask the High Court to Protect a Peaceful Hutterite Colony

[Salvation]

BTTT!

[SJackson]

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