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| New York Times: Easter service in Brooklyn last April |
A day before Thanksgiving, the Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 decision that New York City could not impose limits on the number of attendees of religious gatherings, setting a precedent for mayors and governors across the states. This ruling came after Governor Cuomo’s decision to place attendance caps on religious gatherings in areas of the city where infection rates were climbing, such as Queens and Brooklyn. In areas classified as "red" zones, no more than 10 people were allowed to physically attend gatherings, and in less infected “organe” zones, this number increased to 25.
As COVID-19 surges with the commencement of the holiday season, the nation’s leadership is acting on steep measures to contain the spread. Some call into question whether or not such decisions impede on inalienable rights and freedoms that this country grants. In their process of judicial review, The Supreme Court decision deduced that some efforts to taper COVID-19, such as caps on religious gatherings, have sacrificed protected freedoms on the altar of protecting public health. In a statement about the ruling, Judge Gorsuch criticized Cuomo for limiting religious gatherings while placing no regulations on seemingly less essential activities like acupuncture. The Court’s statement also cited the first amendment, the basis on which they drew their conclusion about the decision’s constitutionality, stating "Even in a pandemic, the constitution cannot be put away and forgotten.”
The decision brings attention to the new ideological balance of the court given the passing of Ruth Bader-Ginsburg and the installment of Coney-Barrett. Earlier in the year, a similar case involving California and Nevada was deliberated while Ginsburg was still on the Court, and the ruling upheld the governors' right to protect public safety.
Gov. Cuomo accused the court of not acting independently and letting their partisan biases shroup their decision making. He went on to say that the decision “doesn’t have any practical effect” because the restrictions on religious services were relaxed after decreased positive test rates in part due to the overturned measure itself. This is best evidenced by the fact that the decision only directly impacted two places of worship.
However, the decision may have larger implications if religious groups in other states call upon this precedent to ease regulations on their own gatherings.
As COVID-19 surges with the commencement of the holiday season, the nation’s leadership is acting on steep measures to contain the spread. Some call into question whether or not such decisions impede on inalienable rights and freedoms that this country grants. In their process of judicial review, The Supreme Court decision deduced that some efforts to taper COVID-19, such as caps on religious gatherings, have sacrificed protected freedoms on the altar of protecting public health. In a statement about the ruling, Judge Gorsuch criticized Cuomo for limiting religious gatherings while placing no regulations on seemingly less essential activities like acupuncture. The Court’s statement also cited the first amendment, the basis on which they drew their conclusion about the decision’s constitutionality, stating "Even in a pandemic, the constitution cannot be put away and forgotten.”
The decision brings attention to the new ideological balance of the court given the passing of Ruth Bader-Ginsburg and the installment of Coney-Barrett. Earlier in the year, a similar case involving California and Nevada was deliberated while Ginsburg was still on the Court, and the ruling upheld the governors' right to protect public safety.
Gov. Cuomo accused the court of not acting independently and letting their partisan biases shroup their decision making. He went on to say that the decision “doesn’t have any practical effect” because the restrictions on religious services were relaxed after decreased positive test rates in part due to the overturned measure itself. This is best evidenced by the fact that the decision only directly impacted two places of worship.
However, the decision may have larger implications if religious groups in other states call upon this precedent to ease regulations on their own gatherings.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/26/nyregion/supreme-court-churches-religious-gatherings.html
6 comments:
I think that it is a mistake to not limit attendance in religious gatherings. Even though religion is very important to many people, safety should always be the top priority of our people and our government. I imagine that this act will be the first of many conservative acts that will be passed over the next few years under the new conservative-dominated supreme court. During a pandemic, this conservative court could cause some issues in terms of limiting (or in this case not limiting) the amount of people in gatherings. I hope that in the future our government and Supreme Court can start to take safety seriously and above all else, because no matter how important religion is to our culture, health and livelihood should always come first. Thank you for sharing!
While I do understand that religious gatherings are extremely important to many individuals, these large congregations are potentially putting them at risk. Our current situation is one that is far from normal, and to put people's health in jeopardy when it can be avoided is not necessarily ideal. I understand that religious freedom protections must be heavily considered, but there is evidence that these gatherings have led to outbreaks. According to Lindsay Wiley, a director of the Health and Law program at American University Washington College of Law, she believes that the Supreme Court's decision goes against many lower-court decisions and is going to change how state and local governments craft their restriction orders. Keeping along with their firm stance on religious protections, some Supreme Court justices have even said that states cannot impose tighter restrictions on churches and synagogues than they do on grocery stores. I feel that this decision is not helping to remedy the coronavirus and may pose more issues in the future.
I personally believe that there should have been restrictions on the number of individuals in religious gatherings. Although these gatherings are very customary especially during this time of year, with many religious holidays coming, it poses as a serious health risk to hold large gatherings. With cases reported earlier in the year, such as over 650 cases linked to only 40 church-related events, an influx of church sermons could result in a drastic rise in cases. And even though religion is very important, the safety of the population and maintaining the pandemic should be taking precedent, because the sooner we can stabilize the pandemic, the quicker people can feel comfortable meeting in public and religious events.
In regards to the lack of regulation for other public services, New York City is planning on entering another lockdown phase come December 1st, which will help reduce the number of public gatherings as a whole and hopefully slow the increase in cases. But with this Court case, it could impede the effectiveness of the lockdown. Furthermore, the impact of this case has already started bleeding to other states. For example, the LA Times reported that several LA churches have sent appeals asking the court to lift their restrictions on indoor church services.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/08/us/coronavirus-churches-outbreaks.html
https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2020-11-26/supreme-courts-conservatives-lift-covid-restrictions-on-new-york-houses-of-worship
It is abundantly clear that religious freedom, practice and gatherings are incredibly important to many people's lives. With that being said, restricting some parts of life like indoor dining, and reasons for being in public spaces, etc, cannot be fully effective if there are other decisions that counteract like- like not restricting religious gatherings. These practices are ones that invite a large demographic of people, especially regarding age group, which also leaves room for sharing covid from a variety of different standpoints. Some children went back to school or have seen friends often (which while they don't contract and spread the disease as easily, the nature for younger people to be asymptomatic brings the possibility of spreading the disease without being aware of it). Many people are essential workers and are working in public places everyday- their risk automatically goes up because of this and no matter how careful they are, they can contract and spread it easily as well. And older age groups that would decide to attend religious gatherings are often even more at risk and put them in danger. Additionally, the infectious period is around 1-3 (meaning you are able to spread the virus to others before ever developing symptoms) which also makes assembling with large groups of people that come from a variety of different places and work, etc, even more dangerous. Now, when I mention all of these considerations, I mean it to encourage restrictions on many different aspects of life. Restricting religious gatherings without doing so to other public places is just as ineffective as the opposite. Classifying religious gatherings as nonessential or essential is controversial and often depends on who you ask. But it is very obvious that, in general, people are tired of the virus, and many people are pretty unwilling to support restrictions and lockdowns; In the end, however, it is also important to realize that these measures can only be as effective as possible if all different aspects of risk are addressed.
The conflict between safety and freedom is a hard one, and the prioritization of one over the other is bound to leave people unhappy no matter what the outcome. It seems the consensus among the other comments on this post is that there should be more regulations on religious gatherings. However, since the government can't impose rules themselves, I believe one of the best options is to encourage religious leaders and followers to act with caution. Perhaps a christian who usually attends church every Sunday could limit their attendance to every other week, or even attend church at a less busy time to come into contact with fewer people.
I don't think Cuomo was in the wrong for placing restrictions on gatherings and I think that they should have been held up. I understand the importance of religion, especially during this trying time, but I don't think it's smart to let religious gatherings to interfere with basic health protocols during a pandemic. Especially now, when there have been quite a few holidays and there are quite a few holidays around the corner, it would be unsafe and unwise to not place restrictions on gatherings of ALL kinds. I don't think that limiting religious gatherings imposes on a person's right to practice the religion they choose, as it's not speaking down on anyone's religion or emplacing rules that keep people from freedom of religion. In the middle of a raging pandemic, I think that everyone needs to make some sacrifices in order to ensure the health and safety of themselves and others.
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