On January 13, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) struck down the Biden Administration’s vaccine mandate that was to apply to all large employers. That same day, the Supreme Court upheld the administration’s vaccine mandate that applies to healthcare workers at healthcare facilities that receive Medicare and Medicaid.
These
It appears as though another term of the Supreme Court will close without the high court evaluating a religious land use claim under The Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA). An Amish community from Minnesota had asked the U.S. Supreme Court to consider whether state laws requiring the
For more than 20 years now, the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) has sought to ensure houses of worship are treated the same as similar secular land uses, regardless of other considerations or laws that might be implicated. A recent case out of Maryland reaffirms this concept,
March 2021
Federal Government, New Jersey Town Reach Settlement of RLUIPA Case One Day After It Was Filed
In most Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) cases, the plaintiff is a religious organization and the defendant is a local government. However, there are some instances when the religious organization gains the support of a second, powerful plaintiff – the U.S. Department of Justice. That was the
It was just last year that the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, or RLUIPA, celebrated its 20th anniversary. During that time, the U.S. Supreme Court has never issued a substantive opinion on a religious land use matter based on RLUIPA. However, the Supreme Court has now issued an
A Florida court held that a church, as part of its religious exercise, can offer its parking lot as an access point to a nearby beach to general members of the public. Pass-A-Grille Beach Community Church, just outside St. Petersburg, Florida, argued that the local government’s attempts to restrict the
A New York village settled one lawsuit alleging violations of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) while the U.S. Department of Justice filed a new, larger lawsuit against the village alleging a broad, ongoing practice of discriminating against religious land uses. The federal government’s lawsuit alleges that
