Posted on 06/29/2023 7:54:44 AM PDT by Reno89519
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled unanimously for a postal worker in Pennsylvania in an important religious liberty dispute, over now far employers should go to accommodate faith-based requests in the workplace.
Gerald Groff, a Christian mail carrier, from Pennsylvania, asked the court to decide if U.S. Postal Service could require him to deliver Amazon packages on Sundays, which he observes as the Sabbath. His attorney, Aaron Streett, argued in April that the court should revisit a 50-year-old precedent that established a test to determine when employers should make accommodations for their employees' religious practices.
In ruling for the government worker, the high court overturned its 1977 precedent that said employers had to "reasonably accommodate" an employee's religious beliefs and practices, so long as it did not create an "undue hardship" on the business.
The new decision tightens the "undue hardship" standard, and could make it easier for some individual employees to secure a religious accommodation in the workplace.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Impact to be determined. Can anyone now ask, with expectation of approval, for day off to go to church?
Good! Now maybe this will prompt people to stop going to little Skyler’s tee-ball games on Sunday AM....
I guess it depends how it impacts the business. If there are a number of other employees in a business to do the work on a Sunday, then people would get the day off to go to church.
It should only be those who were hired when Sundays were days off. Or it was agreed to when you were hired. For example, I know a woman who works at Winn Dixie as a cashier. When she was hired she said no Sundays. The manager has accepted that for years. However, if a manager comes in and says “too bad”. She may have a case. I doubt that would happen at least at Winn Dixie.
While I do think the postal worker took advantage of the company with his Religion issue...I’m all for ruling in favor for Religion...since it applicable to so many issues in these times...
How about going back to the days when businesses were closed on Sundays, and some on Wednesday afternoons?
Any major jew with half a heart surely will tell you, my friend: The sabbath is Saturday!
I suspect there were two major factors in favor of the plaintiff in this case:
1. His post office location did not operate on Sundays when he started working there. They signed the agreement with Amazon to do Sunday deliveries after he was already working there.
2. The USPS initially agreed to his request for a religious accommodation by transferring him to another nearby location that did not have Sunday deliveries. This step indicated that they recognized the legitimacy of his request.
Surprised by that.
Compromised to get the unconstitutional rulings the left most wanted.
How did the postal worker “take advantage”. When he started, there was no Sunday work. When it changed, they first moved him to a location without Sunday work. Then later, forced his resignation because he wouldn’t work Sunday for Amazon deliveries. He had fair expectation on several grounds to have the Sabbath off.
Yes, they do by some reports trade on rulings.
Nice Steely Dan pun.
cuz there’s millions of christians who work on sundays.
This could get interesting. The USPS picked up amazon parcel delivery on Sundays. They don’t do anything else except parcel delivery, but they get a metric crapload of them. They don’t need the whole weekday crew to do it, but it is not a popular pastime, i.e. nobody hardly wants to work on Sundays.
So this ruling could hurt the USPS, if enough people use the religious exemption as a way to get out of this, USPS could lose the contract.
They also deliver the Amazon parcels on all the major federal holidays now - even Memorial Day. I think maybe Christmas is exempted and maybe, Thanksgiving.
Good news...
What it established is that when you hire someone, if they have said that they can not work a certain day for religious reasons and you agree, you can not renig just because you want to.
Which was the case here.
It would also follow with other religious accomidations. So know what you are agreeing to before you agree.
Which used to be the standard before the government decided the standard did not apply to them because they were special.
The SCOTUS understands that the majority of people working for the USG either don’t believe in God, or they attend Chruch anyway; therefore, this ruling may have impact within a small postal branch but will not hurt POs that more than a few employees. Besides, if it comes down to it, the USPS can offer someone else the work on Sundays in certain locals, either from other POs, or retired Postal workers, or even contractors.
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