The Justice Department holds that the Lutherans cannot fire Perich for complaining to the government even if church teaching forbids it. <\/p>\n
And it was this question \u2013 when might the government\u2019s interest in preventing discrimination trump a religious group\u2019s principles? \u2013 that prompted the justices to ask the attorney for the government\u2019s Equal Employment Opportunity Commission during Oct. 5 oral arguments why female priests could not be mandated by the government on similar grounds. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe belief of the Catholic Church that priests should be male only \u2013 you do defer to that, even if the Lutherans say, look, our dispute resolution belief is just as important to a Lutheran as the all-male clergy is to a Catholic?\u201d asked Chief Justice John Roberts, questioning Leodra Kruger, the U.S. solicitor general\u2019s assistant who represented the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes,\u201d Kruger responded. \u201cBut that\u2019s because the balance of relative public and private interests is different in each case.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDo you believe, Miss Kruger, that a church has a right that\u2019s grounded in the Free Exercise Clause and\/or the Establishment Clause to institutional autonomy with respect to its employees?\u201d asked Justice Elena Kagan.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t see that line of church autonomy principles in the religion clause jurisprudence as such,\u201d the federal government\u2019s attorney replied. <\/p>\n
Kruger also said the ministerial exception to discrimination laws was not simply a part of the First Amendment\u2019s guarantee of the \u201cfree exercise of religion.\u201d <\/p>\n
Justice Scalia then pressed Kruger on the difference between ordinary \u201cassociations\u201d \u2013 subject to a range of anti-discrimination laws \u2013 and religious ones. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere is nothing in the Constitution that explicitly prohibits the government from mucking around in a labor organization,\u201d said Justice Scalia, \u201cbut there, black on white in the text of the Constitution are special protections for religion. And you say that makes no difference?\u201d<\/p>\n
Kruger\u2019s response included her explanation of what the government considers \u201cthe core of the ministerial exception as it was originally conceived \u2026 which is that there are certain relationships within a religious community that are so fundamental, so private and ecclesiastical in nature, that it will take an extraordinarily compelling governmental interest to (allow) just interference.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Justice Breyer pushed the federal government\u2019s attorney to say how far she believed the protection extended. <\/p>\n
\u201cSuppose you have a religion and the central tenet is: \u2018You have a problem with what we do, go to the synod; don\u2019t go to court,\u2019\u201d he asked. \u201cSo would that not be protected by the First Amendment?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not protected,\u201d Kruger responded.<\/p>\n
The government attorney went on to attack Hosanna-Tabor\u2019s use of the ministerial exception, which she said would mean \u201c that the hiring and firing decisions with respect to parochial school teachers and with respect to priests is categorically off limits\u201d to federal regulators.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe think that that is a rule that is insufficiently attentive to the relative public and private interests at stake,\u201d she said, citing \u201cinterests that this Court has repeatedly recognized are important in determining freedom of association claims.\u201d <\/p>\n
It was then that Breyer sprung the question of whether a woman might sue over her exclusion from the Catholic priesthood, on the same basis that Perich was suing over a religiously-grounded termination.<\/p>\n
Kruger said the two situations were different \u2013 not categorically, but rather because \u201cthe private and public interests are very different in the two scenarios.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cThe government\u2019s general interest in eradicating discrimination in the workplace is simply not sufficient to justify changing the way that the Catholic Church chooses its priests, based on gender roles that are rooted in religious doctrine,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
But, she said, the government does have a \u201ccompelling and indeed overriding interest in ensuring that individuals are not prevented from coming to the government with information about illegal conduct,\u201d even if the church in question would prohibit its members from doing so on religious grounds.<\/p>\n
Justice Samuel Alito pointed out that this distinction between the Lutherans\u2019 lawsuit prohibition on the one hand, and the Catholic Church\u2019s male priesthood on the other, seemed arbitrary. <\/p>\n
Kruger\u2019s clearest articulation of the Obama administration\u2019s position on religious freedom came in response to Justice Kagan\u2019s question as to whether she was \u201cwilling to accept the ministerial exception for substantive discrimination claims, just not for retaliation claims.\u201d <\/p>\n
The government\u2019s lawyer responded that \u201csubstantive discrimination\u201d claims, such as those alleging sex discrimination, could also be legitimate grounds for a lawsuit against some religious institutions<\/strong>. <\/p><\/blockquote>\nHopefully, the court will tell the Executive to go to hell. But you never know. This, and gay \u201cmarriage\u201d will probably be the first ways in which the State will attempt to exert control over the internal affairs and sacramental life of the Church. I can imagine a day coming when the State will also attempt meddle in the Eucharist by imposing some dumb regulation about the dangers of wheat gluten. Or somebody will try to declare the anointing of the sick to be a violation of medical regulations. The State can be quite creative when it wants to crush the Church. For the Church will, on this point, tell the State to buzz off. We went through all this with the Investiture Controversy.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Seriously. The Obama Administration is trying to make the case before SCOTUS that it can charge religious institutions with sexual discrimination if they don\u2019t ordain women: The Justice Department holds that the Lutherans cannot fire Perich for complaining to the government even if church teaching forbids it. And it was this question \u2013 when might […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":92,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30502","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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