First Amendment · WikiFramers

Freedom of Religion · Module 8A

Free Exercise, Part II

What survived Smith: the ministerial exception, the individualised-exemption escape hatch, and the modern cases that have narrowed neutrality and general applicability almost to vanishing.

Assigned reading

Chemerinsky, Constitutional Law (7th ed. 2023) — 1497–1524.

The casebook is the assigned text for this course. This page is the map: what the Module is doing, in what order, and what goes with it.

Topics

Neutrality and general applicability after Smith; the secular-exception problem. Religious animus. Free exercise during emergencies. RFRA and RLUIPA as statutory overlays. Free exercise and antidiscrimination law.

Reading list

0 of 7 readings published · the rest are in preparation and will appear here as they are edited

  1. Opinion Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. City of Hialeah in preparation
  2. Opinion City of Boerne v. Flores in preparation
  3. Opinion Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. in preparation
  4. Opinion Masterpiece Cakeshop, Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission in preparation
  5. Opinion Tandon v. Newsom in preparation
  6. Opinion Fulton v. City of Philadelphia in preparation
  7. Opinion Groff v. DeJoy in preparation

This module in Canvas

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How to read this list

A case named without a marker is assigned as an opinion and is to be read in its entirety. Opinion (edited) means the Professor has cut it for length; the text on this site is the assigned text. Note means the case is not assigned as an opinion at all — its holding, its facts to the extent they matter, and its place in the doctrinal line are given in a note written for this course, and you are responsible for that note exactly as you are responsible for an assigned opinion. Most modules close with a Current case, a recent decision chosen because it shows the doctrine you have just read being applied at its live edge; current cases are assigned as opinions. You are responsible for all assigned required materials, including the notes, questions, problems and commentary that accompany the cases, whether or not we discuss them in class.