wfn.org | End of Religious Freedom Restoration Act

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"UNITED METHODIST DAILY NEWS 97" by SUSAN PEEK on April 15, 1997 at 14:24
Eastern, about DAILY NEWS RELEASES FROM UNITED METHODIST NEWS SERVICE (189
notes).

Note 189 by UMNS on June 30, 1997 at 16:28 Eastern (3777 characters).

Produced by United Methodist News Service, official news agency of
the United Methodist Church, with offices in Nashville, Tenn., New
York, and Washington.

Contact:  Joretta Purdue                          377(10-71B){189}
          Washington, D.C.  (202) 546-8722           June 30, 1997

Religious Freedom Restoration Act
struck down to dismay of officials

     WASHINGTON (UMNS) -- When the U.S. Supreme Court overturned
the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) in a June 25 decision
here, church officials who had worked for its passage or filed
briefs regarding it were dismayed.
     The Rev. Thom White Wolf Fassett, general secretary of the
United Methodist Board of Church and Society, said the law passed
four years ago protected religious groups from government
interference unless there were "compelling" reasons for it.
     "The RFRA legislation sought to protect the basic principle
of church and state separation, yet the decision shows that the
United States' highest court does not interpret the First
Amendment guarantee of religious freedom to have any substantive
meaning," he declared in a statement issued here.
     The Rev. Oliver Thomas, special counsel for religious and
civil liberties of the National Council of Churches and chairman
of the Coalition for the Free Exercise of Religion, said the
Supreme Court had "struck down America's best protection for real
religious freedom."
     He predicted that "every religious person in the United
States will be hurt by this decision. It will simply take time for
them to realize it."
     The case, City of Bourne v. Flores, involved a zoning
dispute. A Roman Catholic church in an historic area of Bourne,
Texas, had wanted to expand its building to meet the needs of its
larger congregation. The church had based its case on RFRA.
     RFRA's creation followed a Supreme Court decision that struck
down the previously held judicial test requiring the government to
have a "compelling interest" to infringe on religious rights and
practices. This test had prevailed until the 1990 Employment
Division v. Smith.
     In 1993, RFRA was passed unanimously by the House of
Representatives and incurred only three negative votes in the
Senate. The bipartisan effort in Congress resulted from support by
an unusually full spectrum of the religious community as well as
groups such as Americans United for the Separation of Church and
State.
     Thomas said church buildings and church schools are now
vulnerable to new regulations and restrictions.
     Fassett commented that with the safeguards provided by RFRA
now gone "people of faith may soon find that their freedom to live
out their faith and practice their religion may gradually be
subject to government regulation."
     He predicted that religious groups and American Indians would
be at the mercy of state and local governments, and called on the
states "to defend staunchly religious liberties."
     The United Methodist Church's position, expressed in a
resolution passed by the denomination's highest legislative body,
has termed religious liberty and freedom of belief "basic human
rights" which have roots in the Bible, Fassett said.
     Mary Logan, general counsel to the denomination's General
Council on Finance and Administration (GCFA), cited predictions
that the decision will make it much more difficult for religious
organizations to fight such issues as schools prohibiting Jewish
boys from wearing yarmulkes or forcing the Amish to attach orange
reflective materials to their wagons and buggies.
     Both GCFA and the Board of Church and Society had filed
"friend of the court" briefs that favored RFRA with the Supreme
Court.
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