News Archive
Professor Robert Katz Comments on Lawsuit Challenging RFRA 'Fix'
12/11/2015
On December 11, Professor Robert Katz commented for the Indianapolis Star in an article entitled "Conservative groups' lawsuit says RFRA fix unconstitutional."
Two conservative lobbying groups filed a lawsuit asserting that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act “fix” is unconstitutional because it infringes on their religious freedom, among other charges. As originally enacted, RFRA would have permitted challenges to local human rights ordinances on grounds that they burdened religious exercise. The "fix," enacted a week later, barred RFRA challenges to such ordinances.
In the Star, Katz is quoted as saying the lawsuit is merely an attempt to influence upcoming legislation. “The plaintiffs tie themselves into pretzels trying to argue that the RFRA fix is unconstitutional,” Katz said in an email. “I see this as more of a political statement than a serious lawsuit: the plaintiffs are trying to arouse pity for people like themselves.”
He saw the lawsuit as commentary on the Senate Republicans’ proposal, Senate Bill 100, to expand the state civil rights law — in part as a criticism, Katz said, “for not doing enough to protect religious conservatives.”
In additional comments Professor Katz said, "In political terms, it implicitly endorses Senate Bill 100 for preempting local human rights ordinances. In the plaintiffs’ view religious conservatives need protection from cities and counties that would infringe upon their religious liberty by compelling them to serve LGBT individuals on equal terms as everyone else. At the same time, the lawsuit implicitly criticizes SB 100 for not doing enough to protect religious conservatives. In the plaintiffs’ view, SB 100 is flawed because it fails to exempt a deserving set of organizations from anti-discrimination laws – namely, establishments offering goods and services to the public (also known as ‘public accommodations’) that are not formally religious or religiously affiliated or that have four or more employees.”
Professor Katz is an expert on law and religion and the law of nonprofit organizations. His current scholarship focuses on the tension between religious freedom and anti-discrimination law, especially laws prohibiting discrimination against LGBT individuals.
His article "Indiana's Flawed Religious Freedom Law" is one of the first scholarly analyses of Indiana's Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA).
