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Professor John Hill was a guest on Indianapolis radio station WIBC with “Abdul at Large” program host Abdul Hakim-Shabazz on January 12 to discuss a bill currently being considered in the Indiana General Assembly.

Introduced by State Senator Scott Schneider of Indianapolis, the proposal is called the Indiana Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The bill would permit business owners to decline to serve certain clients based on the claim that serving them would violate their religious freedom. Proponents say the proposal is about religious liberty, while opponents say it is about discrimination.

The Indiana proposal is based upon the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act that was passed in 1993 in response to the case Employment Division, Department of Human Resources of Oregon v. Smith, decided in 1990.

“The issue relates to individuals who feel that they are being compelled to contribute in some way to an activity that they feel is morally and religiously wrong,” Hill said.

Professor Hill holds a J.D. and a doctorate in philosophy, both of which he received from Georgetown University. In addition to being a professor of law at IU McKinney, where he teaches constitutional law, civil procedure, torts, jurisprudence and ethical and legal issues at the end of life, he also is a Grimes Fellow, and an adjunct professor of philosophy in the Department of Philosophy at IUPUI.