In an order released Thursday, the Supreme Court functionally sided with a church and ministry in California that had petitioned the court for an injunction, claiming Gov. Gavin Newsom’s COVID-19 restrictions violated their First Amendment rights.
The order was unsigned, and there were no lengthy opinions or dissents attached, but the court sent the case between Harvest Rock Church and Harvest International Ministry and Newsom back to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals for review in light of the court’s recent ruling regarding houses of worship and COVID-19 restrictions in New York.
While it’s unfortunate that these cases had to be resolved at the Supreme Court, it’s a relief that at least the high court is taking the conflict between pandemic-related restrictions and civil liberties seriously.
In its application for relief, Harvest Rock Church asked the court if the First Amendment “prohibits the government from discriminating against houses of worship by restricting the size of religious gatherings while exempting or giving other preferential treatment to comparable nonreligious gatherings occurring inside the same houses of worship or to other comparable nonreligious gatherings occurring externally.”
The petition also took a stab at Newsom’s executive orders, which seem to treat religious gatherings differently than businesses — orders whose spirit, at the very least, he hasn’t even followed himself, given his publicized and much-criticized outing at The French Laundry. “During his nine-month reign of executive edicts subjugating Californians to restrictions unknown to constitutional law, the governor continues to impose draconian and unconscionable prohibitions on the daily life of all Californians,” the petition reads.
This aligns with the court’s view on similar cases. Just before Thanksgiving, the Supreme Court granted relief to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn and two Orthodox Jewish synagogues, blocking the enforcement of New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s executive order that restricted attendance at houses of worship but allowed other businesses to remain open without the same restrictions. In his concurrence, Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote, “Even if the Constitution has taken a holiday during this pandemic, it cannot become a sabbatical.”
The court could rule on another similar case any day now, this one between a Kentucky Christian school and Gov. Andy Beshear. This, too, is an emergency application and, like previous and similar cases, contests that religious schools are being treated differently than businesses. In Kentucky, Beshear has ordered K-12 schools to close, but movie theaters and colleges, even preschools, can remain open. It’s hard to see, in light of these previous two rulings, how this emergency application will not be granted, or, like the Harvest Church case, tossed back to the lower courts.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh gave Beshear until 4 p.m. Friday to respond to the lawsuit that Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron and Danville Christian Academy filed. The governor’s legal team responded, defending Beshear’s decision to close schools:
For the last several months, there have been dozens of similar lawsuits across the country, arguing that state executive orders trampled on the First Amendment rights of churches and schools. At first, public health experts, political leaders, and liberal commentators scoffed at this, arguing that in a public health crisis, the needs of the collective went before the rights of the individual.
However, this shifted when many local leaders began shifting and crafting mandates arbitrarily and not treating businesses or religious groups the same. The Supreme Court is right to analyze some of the nuances in these cases and come down on the side of the First Amendment and the faithful.
Nicole Russell (@russell_nm) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. She is a journalist who previously worked in Republican politics in Minnesota.
