Your right to religious liberty does not permit you to dodge government regulations requiring the use of masks to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

The Sixth Circuit held yesterday that even if Catholics truly believe that wearing masks is a sin, the government may nonetheless compel them to do so.  

The decision in Resurrection School v. Hertel falls neatly under the “bad facts make bad law” heading. Although the plaintiffs framed the lawsuit as a question of religious freedom, it appears they were never able explain how their Catholic faith requires them to expose their children to a deadly pathogen. Instead, they complained that masks are “uncomfortable and distracting,” and claimed that being uncomfortable and distracted was against their religion. Under long-established Supreme Court precedent, the court had to pretend that these were real religious beliefs.

Nonetheless, the Sixth Circuit said that the mask mandates remained constitutional. Applying the First Amendment framework from Employment Division v. Smith, it first asked whether the mandate was “neutral and generally applicable.” Because the mandate applies equally to religious and nonreligious schools, the court found it neutral and therefore refused to subject it to strict scrutiny.

Instead, the state merely needed to have some “rational basis” for imposing the mask mandate, a bar that it cleared easily, pointing to the spread of COVID-19 throughout the state and the abundant evidence that wearing masks in schools helps reduce the spread of the disease.

If you are seeking to challenge mask mandates, vaccination requirements, or any other COVID-19 countermeasures as a violation of your First Amendment rights, we recommend that you contact someone else. Our firm believes in science and dreads a return to remote learning.

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