...So what is the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, and what does it say?
The first RFRA was a 1993 federal law that was signed into law by Democratic president Bill Clinton. It unanimously passed the House of Representatives, where it was sponsored by then-congressman Chuck Schumer, and sailed through the Senate on a 97-3 vote.
The law reestablished a balancing test for courts to apply in religious liberty cases (a standard had been used by the Supreme Court for decades). RFRA allows a person's free exercise of religion to be "substantially burdened" by a law only if the law furthers a "compelling governmental interest" in the "least restrictive means of furthering that compelling governmental interest."
So the law doesn't say that a person making a religious claim will always win.
In the years since RFRA has been on the books, sometimes the courts have ruled in favor of religious exemptions, but many other times they haven't.
Great question. In a 1997 Supreme Court case (City of Boerne v. Flores), the court held that federal RFRA was generally inapplicable against state and local laws. In the years since RFRA has been on the books, sometimes the courts have ruled in favor of religious exemptions, but many other times they haven't.
Since then, a number of states have enacted their own RFRA statutes: Indiana became the twentieth to do so.
Other states have state court rulings that provide RFRA-like protections.
Here's a helpful map from 2014 that shows you which states have RFRA protections (note that Mississippi and Indiana have passed RFRA since this map was made):...
Lots more.
Read on.
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