Court Supervision of Church Election Invalidated by Mississippi Supreme Court

In Melton v. Union Hill Missionary Baptist Church, (MS Sup. Ct., Jan. 11, 2024), the Mississippi Supreme Court reversed and vacated a decision of a state Chancery Court in a dispute over whether a church had dismissed its pastor.  After an initial vote to oust the pastor, the pastor continued to preach at the church.  The church filed suit and the chancellor ordered the congregation to hold a second vote at a church meeting at which the chancellor would preside. That meeting voted to retain the pastor. Invalidating the chancellor's order to hold a new meeting, the Supreme Court said in part:

The chancellor’s self appointment to oversee a congregational election outside the courthouse and inside a house of worship is far removed from the judicial function and treads heavily upon Mississippi’s Constitution and the Establishment Clause. Thus, the chancellor’s actions, though undoubtedly well intended, amounted to a constitutional violation, resulting in a blending of church and state. This unusual arrangement was the antithesis of the constitutional doctrine that historically has demanded separation of church and state....

Because the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine applies, this Court reverses and vacates the orders of the Madison County Chancery Court.

State AG's Warn Target Corp. About Consequences of Its Pride Campaign

Earlier this week, the Indiana Attorney General, joined by the Attorneys General of Arkansas, Idaho, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri and South Carolina sent a joint letter (full text) to the CEO of Target Corp. complaining about the company's promotion and sale of products supporting Pride month. The states' legal officers suggested that Target may have violated state child-protection and parental rights laws.  It also suggests that Target has violated its duties to the states as shareholders of Target stock (presumably held in state pension funds).  The 5-page, heavily footnoted letter said in part:

As the chief legal officers of our States, we are charged with enforcing state laws protecting children and safeguarding parental rights.... 

In light of these responsibilities, we wish to communicate our concern for Target’s recent “Pride” campaign. During this campaign, Target wittingly marketed and sold LGBTQIA+ promotional products to families and young children as part of a comprehensive effort to promote gender and sexual identity among children...  Target also sold products with anti-Christian designs, such as pentagrams, horned skulls, and other Satanic products....

In connection with its “Pride” campaign, Target provides financial support to an organization called GLSEN (pronounced “glisten”). GLSEN furnishes resources to activists for the purpose of undermining parents’ constitutional and statutory rights by supporting “secret gender transitions for kids” and directing public schools to withhold “any information that may reveal a student’s gender identity to others, including [to] parents or guardians.”...

...Target’s directors and officers have a fiduciary duty to our States as shareholders in the company. The evidence suggests that Target’s directors and officers may be negligent in undertaking the “Pride” campaign, which negatively affected Target’s stock price. Moreover, it may have improperly directed company resources for collateral political or social goals unrelated to the company’s and its shareholders’ best interests....

We live in a different day and age from our nation’s founding. But certain immutable precepts and principles must always endure so long as America is to remain free and prosperous.

CBS News reports on the letter.

Mississippi Must Grant Religious Exemptions To School Vaccination Requirements

 In Bosarge v. Edney, (SD MS, April 18, 2023), a Mississippi federal district court issued a preliminary injunction requiring Mississippi's State Health Officer, as well as school officials named as defendants, to provide religious exemptions from the state's mandatory vaccination requirements for school children. The court said in part:

The face of the statute allows for medical exemptions but affords no exemption for religious beliefs, and the Complaint alleges that this constitutes “an unconstitutional value judgment that secular (i.e., medical) motivations for opting out of compulsory immunization are permitted, but that religious motivations are not.”....

The Attorney General’s argument is essentially that the Compulsory Vaccination Law does not violate the Free Exercise Clause because the [Mississippi Religious Freedom Restoration Act] MRFRA saves it.... Taking this argument to its logical conclusion as to Plaintiffs’ facial challenge, no Mississippi statute could ever violate the Free Exercise Clause on its face because the more general, non-specific MRFRA applies to all State laws and operates to cure any law that would otherwise be deemed to violate the Free Exercise Clause.... However, at least in this case, the Court is not persuaded that the MRFRA can be read in this fashion with respect to Plaintiffs’ facial challenge.

RNS reports on the decision.

Objectors To Religious Motto on License Plates May Cover the Motto

In Griggs v. Graham, (SD MS, March 2, 2023), plaintiffs objected to the design of the default Mississippi license plates that included the state seal, a part of which was the motto "In God We Trust."  Specialty plates that carry alternative designs are more expensive, and are not available at all for trailers, RVs and motorcycles. The court, relying on the U.S. Supreme Court's 1977 decision in Wooley v. Maynard, refused to require the state to issue separate non-religious license plates, saying in part:

[A]s in Wooley, the Plaintiffs have articulated a violation of their First Amendment free speech rights. They cannot be compelled to display “In God We Trust” on their license plate. 

In Wooley, however, the Supreme Court did not require New Hampshire to create a blank license plate for persons who objected to “Live Free or Die.” No, the remedy in that case was an injunction blocking New Hampshire “from arresting and prosecuting [the Wooleys] at any time in the future for covering over [the objectionable] portion of their license plates... [T]he Supreme Court put the burden of compliance on the objectors—they were allowed to cover up the message—and then enjoined the state criminal law that penalized that action....

In Count II of their Amended Complaint, the Plaintiffs allege that the State has breached its duty of neutrality by elevating persons who believe in God while simultaneously “demonstrat[ing] . . . hostility toward the Plaintiffs and other Mississippi car owners who lack religious beliefs.”...

The Plaintiffs no doubt believe that more recent free exercise cases promise them greater rights to neutrality than this single 1977 case....  [I]f their desire is to overturn Wooley, they will have to seek that relief from a higher court.

Mississippi Governor Signs Ban on Gender Transition Procedures for Minors

Yesterday Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves signed into law House Bill 1125, the Regulate Experimental Adolescent Procedures Act (full text). The new law bans providing gender transition procedures (including puberty blockers, hormonal treatments and surgery) for persons under the age of 18.  It also prohibits use of public funds and Medicaid coverage for such procedures and prohibits state income tax deductions for expenses of the procedures.  In a press release announcing his signing of the bill, Governor Reeves said in part:

At the end of the day, there are two positions here. One tells children that they’re beautiful the way they are. That they can find happiness in their own bodies. The other tells them that they should take drugs and cut themselves up with expensive surgeries in order to find freedom from depression. I know which side I’m on.

Mississippi Trial Court Says State's High Court Would No Langer Find Abortion Right In State Constitution

 In Jackson Women's Health Organization v. Dobbs, (MS Ch., July 5, 2022), an abortion provider on behalf of itself and its patients sought a preliminary injunction to prohibit enforcement of two Mississippi abortion bans-- a 2007 Trigger Ban statute (triggered by the overruling of Roe v. Wade) and a 2019 six-week Fetal Heartbeat ban.  Plaintiffs, relying on Pro-Choice Mississippi v Fordice, a 1998 Mississippi Supreme Court decision, argued that the Mississippi Constitution protects the right to an abortion. The Chancery Court, however, denied a preliminary injunction, concluding that the Mississippi Supreme Court will no longer affirm its holding in Fordice, saying in part:

The Fordice court compared Section 32 of the Mississippi Constitution to the Ninth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Neither Constitutional provision made specific reference to any protection for abortion. The Court largely rested its finding of a state protected right to abortion to that federal constitutional right found by the Roe Court to flow from the Ninth Amendment.

Mississippi Free Press reports on the decision. [Thanks to Scott Mange for the lead.]

Ecclesiastical Abstention Doctrine Bars Mississippi Courts From Adjudicating Claims Of Fired Diocese Finance Officer

In Catholic Diocese of Jackson, Mississippi v. DeLange, (MS Sup. Ct., June 16, 2022), the Mississippi Supreme Court held that the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine prevents Mississippi courts from adjudicating wrongful termination, defamation and infliction of emotional distress claims brought by the former Finance officer of the diocese.  Plaintiff was given several reasons for his termination by the bishop. Under the Code of Canon Law, the Finance officer can be removed only for "grave cause." Plaintiff claimed that the reasons given for his termination were false. The court said in part:

 ... de Lange argues that his request merely asks a court to determine the truthfulness of the reasons given by the Diocese for his termination. De Lange insists that a civil court will not be required to interpret the Code of Canon Law. We disagree.

Even if the Diocese’s reasons were found to be based on falsehoods, and we are making no such determination, a reason existed for de Lange’s termination. That is, there was some reason for his termination, whether it is one of the reasons cited by the Diocese or, perhaps, it is simply the apparent incompatibility that existed between de Lange and Bishop Kopacz. Whatever that reason may be and regardless of the strength of that reason, the request that de Lange now makes ... would ultimately require judicial interpretation of what constitutes “grave cause” under the Code of Canon Law....  Such an interpretation is off limits for a civil court to make.

Parents' Group Says Infrastructure Appropriations To Private Schools Violate Mississippi Constitution

A parents' organization has filed suit in a Mississippi state trial court challenging two Mississippi laws that together appropriate $10 million for grants to private or nonpublic schools for water, sewer and broadband infrastructure projects.  The appropriated funds come from federal Coronavirus State Fiscal Recovery Funds received under the American Rescue Plan. The complaint (full text) in Parents for Public Schools v. Mississippi Department of Finance and Administration, (MS Chancery Ct., filed 6/15/2022), contends that the Mississippi laws violate Section 208 of the Mississippi Constitution that provides:

No religious or other sect or sects shall ever control any part of the school or other educational funds of this state; nor shall any funds be appropriated toward the support of any sectarian school, or to any school that at the time of receiving such appropriation is not conducted as a free school.

The Mississippi ACLU issued a press release announcing the filing of the lawsuit. 

Consent Decree Entered In Suit Claiming Religious Discrimination In Action Against Mosque Construction

 A consent decree (full text) was entered yesterday in a Mississippi federal district court in Abraham House of God and Cemetery, Inc. v. City of Horn Lake, (ND MS, Jan. 3, 2022). The suit alleged that the City of Horn Lake denied approval of the site plan for a proposed mosque because of religious animus. (See prior posting.) The consent decree requires the city to approve the site plan within two weeks, and to act promptly on future applications for permits relating to construction of the mosque.  ACLU issued a press release announcing the filing of the consent decree.

Oral Arguments In Supreme Court On Mississippi Abortion Case

Here are links to the transcript and audio of oral arguments this morning in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, a challenge to the Mississippi law which bars most abortions after 15 weeks of gestation. CNN reports on the arguments.

Supreme Court Will Hear Arguments Wednesday In Term's Major Abortion Case

Tomorrow morning, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, a challenge to the Mississippi law which bars most abortions after 15 weeks of gestation. In the case, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the statute. (See prior posting.) In granting certiorari, the Supreme Court limited the question on review to: "Whether all pre-viability prohibitions on elective abortions are unconstitutional." Mississippi's brief in the case starkly lay out the major issue, contending: "Roe and Casey are egregiously wrong. The conclusion that abortion is a constitutional right has no basis in text, structure, history, or tradition."

Amy Howe at SCOTUSblog has a preview of the arguments. The SCOTUSblog case page has links to the vast number of amicus briefs and other filings in the case. The oral arguments will be streamed live at this link when the Court convenes at 10:00 AM Eastern Time on Wednesday.

141 Amicus Briefs Filed In Mississippi Abortion Law Case

Oral arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the much-watched Mississippi abortion case, will be heard by the Supreme Court on December 1. A near-record number of amicus (friend-of-the-court) briefs have been filed in the case-- 141 in total on the merits. Links to nearly all of the briefs are available on the SCOTUS blog case page for the case. A 2020 National Law Journal article says that the record for number of amicus briefs in one Supreme Court case is 156.

Mississippi City Is Sued Over Refusal To Approve Mosque Site Plan

Suit was filed yesterday in a Mississippi federal district court alleging that the City of Horn Lake denied approval of the site plan for a proposed mosque because of religious animus. The suit alleges violation of various provisions of RLUIPA as well as the 1st Amendment. The complaint (full text) in Abraham House of God and Cemetery, Inc. v. City of Horn Lake, (ND MS, filed 11/3/2021) alleges in part:

Despite the pretextual excuses for their decision, Board members did not work very hard to hide the true reason they denied approval for the project—anti-Muslim prejudice. As then Alderman John E. Jones Jr. told the local newspaper: “I don’t care what they say, their religion says they can lie or do anything to the Jews or gentiles because we’re not Muslims.” In making his motion to reject the mosque’s proposed site plan, Jones ominously warned his fellow Board members, “[I]f you let them build it, they will come. So I think we need to stop it before it gets here.”...

In sum, what should have been an uncomplicated approval of the site plan for the Abraham House of God foundered in a storm of anti-Muslim bias.

ACLU of Mississippi issued a press release announcing the filing of the lawsuit.

Zoning Ordinance Violates Equal Terms Provision of RLUIPA

In The Church at Jackson v. Hinds County, Mississippi, (SD MS, Sept. 23, 2021), a Mississippi federal district court held that the equal terms provision of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act is violated by provisions on Agricultural Districts in Hinds County's zoning ordinance. The court issued a preliminary injunction, holding that the ordinance treats religious assemblies on less than equal terms with nonreligious assemblies, specifically recreational facilities. Recreational facilities are permitted unconditionally to locate in areas zoned Agricultural, while religious institutions are required to obtain a Special Use Permit in order to do so.

Mississippi Supreme Court Rejects Claims By Pastor's Former Wife Against His Church On Unusual Facts

In Woodard v. Miller, (MS Sup. Ct., Aug. 12, 2021), the Mississippi Supreme Court applied the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine in an unusual context.  Plaintiff Kim Miller married Andrew Johnson when he was a seminary student studying to be a United Methodist Church minister. Church officials encouraged Miller to give up her higher education plans to serve as a minister's wife, and told her that the church would provide for her needs. After more than 20 years of marriage, Miller filed for divorce. She took this step after Johnson confessed to her that he was gay, had contracted HIV from an extramarital affair, and had infected Miller.

Miller sued her ex-husband, the United Methodist Church Conference and a fellow-pastor asserting a variety of claims. She asserted that "had the conference and the fellow minister followed United Methodist policy and procedure, they would have discovered Johnson’s behavior and remedied it or warned Miller before she contracted HIV."

The court dismissed plaintiff's claims against the church, saying in part:

[U]nder the First Amendment, for Miller’s claim to proceed against MUMC, the claimed assumed duty cannot be religious or ecclesiastical in nature.... And we are hard-pressed to see how Miller’s claim would hold up if it were against a non-religious employer. Though Miller personally interpreted MUMC’s promise to provide for her and her family if she gave up her own career goals as both an assurance of sufficient financial remuneration and a guarantee against her husband committing adultery, such an interpretation would be considered wholly unreasonable if the promise was being made by, say, a law firm, a hospital, or a technology company. In other words, Miller interpreted the assurances of MUMC ministers as including guaranteeing the success of her marriage and family life precisely because her fiancé was going into church ministry. Thus, her claim fails because the religious nature of his employer cannot be the basis for recognizing a legal duty....

The court dismissed Miller's claim against the fellow-pastor because: "a fiduciary duty cannot arise merely from a minister-church member relationship."

Finally, the court, over the dissent of two judges allowed plaintiff to move ahead on her claims against her former husband, rejecting his defense that the claims against him were released as part of the divorce settlement. The majority held that Johnson had waived this defense.

Suit Challenges "In God We Trust" On Mississippi License Plates

Suit was filed yesterday in a Mississippi federal district court by atheist and secular humanist plaintiffs challenging the constitutionality of Mississippi including the state seal-- which carries the motto "In God We Trust" -- on its standard license plate. The complaint (full text) in Griggs v. Graham, (SD MI, filed 6/22/2021) alleges violations of both the free speech and free exercise clauses, saying in part:

The Standard Tag ... sends an ideological message endorsed by ... the State of Mississippi.... The Defendant enforces Mississippi statutes and maintains regulations, policies, practices, and customs that require a car owner to display license tags delivering the State of Mississippi’s chosen ideological message....

The statutes, rules, policies, practices, and customs enforced by Defendant ... are not neutral. Not only is “IN GOD WE TRUST” an expressly religious message, but the public statements of Mississippi officials ... demonstrate that hostility toward the Plaintiffs and other Mississippi car owners who lack religious beliefs was a motivation for selecting the current Standard Tag design.

WLOX reports on the lawsuit.

Supreme Court Grants Review In Mississippi Abortion Ban Case

Yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court granted review in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Center, (Docket No. 19-2392, certiorari granted 5/17/2021). (Order List). In the case, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down a Mississippi statute that prohibits abortions, with limited exceptions, after 15 weeks' gestational age. The Supreme Court limited its grant of review to Question 1 presented in the petition for certiorari:

Whether all pre-viability prohibitions on elective abortions are unconstitutional.

Here is the SCOTUSblog case page with all the filings in the case. NPR reports on the Court's grant of review.

Mississippi Bans Transgender Women From Girls' and Women's Sports Teams

Yesterday Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves signed Senate Bill 2536 (full text) which prohibits women's or girl's athletic teams being open to transgender women.  The ban applies to any interscholastic or intramural athletic teams or sports that are sponsored by a public primary or secondary school or any school that is a member of the Mississippi High School Activities Association or public institution of higher education or any higher education institution that is a member of the NCAA, NAIA or NJCCA. According to an AP report, in the signing ceremony for the bill, Gov. Tate said in part:

But for the fact that President Biden as one of his first initiatives sat down and signed an executive order — which, in my opinion, encourages transgenderism amongst our young people — but for that fact, we wouldn't be here today.

5th Circuit Enjoins Enforcement of City's COVID-19 Order Against Church Pending Appeal

Five days after a Mississippi federal district court, in an opinion critical of plaintiff's position, refused to rule immediately on an attempt by a Holly Springs church to hold indoor church services (see prior posting), the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in First Pentecostal Church of Holly Springs v. City of Holly Springs, Mississippi, (5th Cir., May 22, 2020), granted an injunction pending appeal of enforcement of the city's COVID-19 Orders against the church. However the grant came with conditions, reflecting what appears to be ongoing animosity between the church and city officials, and somewhat competing Orders by the state and the city. In granting the injunction, the court said in part:

We do this upon the assurances by the Church that it will “satisf[y] the requirements entitling similarly situated businesses and operations to reopen.” In this vein, we refer the Church to the Governor’s new “Safe Worship Guidelines for In-Person Worship Services,” which appear similarly rigorous to the City’s requirements for reopening businesses but are tailored to church operations. These guidelines, if implemented in the spirit of the City’s orders, may help the Church abide by its safety pledge during this intervening period while the district court considers the injunction request and while the City continues the ongoing process of evaluating and revising its orders related to COVID-19.

In a concurring opinion, Judge Willett added considerable background:

The First Pentecostal Church of Holly Springs was burned to the ground earlier this week. Graffiti spray-painted in the church parking lot sneered, “Bet you Stay home Now YOU HYPOKRITS.”

The City mentions the church burning in its latest brief, but in a manner less commendable than condemnable. One might expect a city to express sympathy or outrage (or both) when a neighborhood house of worship is set ablaze. One would be mistaken. Rather than condemn the crime’s depravity, the City seized advantage, insisting that the Church’s First Amendment claim necessarily went up in smoke when the church did....

This argument is shameful.

Court Is Critical of Church's Litigation Tactics In Challenge To COVID-19 Order

In First Pentecostal Church of Holly Springs v. City of Holly Springs, Mississippi, (ND MS, May 14, 2020), a Mississippi federal district court refused to rule immediately on an attempt by a Holly Springs church to hold indoor church services.  Both the state and the city have issued  COVID-19 orders that are similar, but the church views the state as being more friendly to religious exercise.  The court, in an  opinion critical of the church's continued litigation, said in part:

This court has found the City to be quite accommodating of the free exercise of religion in this case, including by quickly amending its ordinance to expressly grant plaintiff the right to conduct the drive-in services which it previously requested. Nevertheless, plaintiff appears to regard the Governor, but not the City, as a friend of the exercise of religion, and, that being the case, this court can discern little point in the City choosing to increase its legal exposure by adopting its own executive orders relating to church services, when they are so similar to the Governor’s. The City’s choice of whether or not to adopt the Governor’s orders will be moot if it is determined that the Governor’s orders pre-empt the City’s, but this court raises this as one potential step to bridge the gap of mistrust which clearly exists between the parties in this case.....

Plaintiffs’ briefing on this issue heightens this court’s impression that this entire lawsuit is nothing more than a deeply misguided attempt on their part to gain permission to endanger their own lives and those of their fellow community members. While this court does not rule out the possibility that indoor church services could be held at acceptable risk by a responsible church if sufficient precautions were taken, it has grave concerns whether the plaintiff in this case is sufficiently aware of the gravity of these matters to enable it to do so....

This court observes that plaintiff has made a habit in this litigation of taking the time to carefully prepare briefs (its brief in support of its current motion is 26 pages long) and then demanding an immediate ruling from this court, with opposing counsel left to make hurried arguments in a telephonic hearing. This is a fundamentally unfair process, and this court will no longer tolerate it.