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Religious Discrimination First Amendment Religious Schools

Fisher Phillips

Non-Profit Snapshot: 4 Things Non-Profits Need to Know About SCOTUS’s Religious Tax Exemption Ruling

Fisher Phillips on

Welcome to this edition of the FP Non-Profit Snapshot, where we take a quick look at a recent significant legal development with an emphasis on how it impacts non-profit organizations. This edition focuses on a landmark...more

Baker Donelson

The Supreme Court Declines to Require Religious Charter Schools

Baker Donelson on

In a one-sentence, 4-to-4 per curiam decision, the Supreme Court upheld the Oklahoma Supreme Court's ruling that approval of a religious school's participation in the state's charter school program would violate the...more

Rumberger | Kirk

Supreme Court Appears Split on Whether to Approve Religious Charter School

Rumberger | Kirk on

On April 30, 2025, the United States Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the consolidated cases of Oklahoma Statewide Charter School Board v. Drummond and St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School v. Drummond. If the...more

Parker Poe Adams & Bernstein LLP

Fourth Circuit Delays Arguments in Religious Discrimination Case for Pending Supreme Court Decision

Over the past decade, federal courts have repeatedly reviewed religious-affiliated employers' ability to avoid federal discrimination claims. Courts recognize a "ministerial exception" that prevents discrimination claims by...more

Stoel Rives LLP

U.S. Supreme Court Affirms Religious Freedom in Government Benefits and Employment Decisions

Stoel Rives LLP on

In three cases this term, the U.S. Supreme Court has affirmed the freedom of religious institutions to access government benefits and to make employment decisions....more

Franczek P.C.

Proposed Regulations Would Ease Access to Public Funds for Faith-Based Colleges

Franczek P.C. on

The White House recently announced two initiatives aimed at addressing perceived discrimination in education against students and institutions based on religion. We address the first of those initiatives, relating to prayer...more

Robinson+Cole RLUIPA Defense

Evangelical Church Sues Castle Hills, TX for Denying SUP for Sunday School Space

Wayside Chapel Evangelical Free Church is suing Castle Hills, Texas for denying its application for a special use permit for property located at 113 Ivywood Circle.  The Church claims that the extra space is needed to...more

Holland & Knight LLP

Religious Institutions Update: January 2019 - Lex Est Sanctio Sancta

Holland & Knight LLP on

Courts continue to grapple with the scope and meaning of the ministerial exception doctrine. In Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church & Sch. v. EEOC, 565 U.S. 171 (2012), the U.S. Supreme Court confirmed that a...more

Farrell Fritz, P.C.

Court Admonishes Village for Adopting Laws with a Discriminatory Purpose

Farrell Fritz, P.C. on

Local governments in New York may regulate land use within their borders directly through their zoning codes and indirectly by adopting a variety of other statutes and regulations. ...more

Robinson+Cole RLUIPA Defense

Christian School’s Claims Dismissed as Unripe Under Midrash Sephardi

A district court in the Southern District of Florida has dismissed as unripe claims brought by Centro de Ensenanza Palabra de Fe, Inc. (“Centro”), a tax-exempt religious organization that operates a daycare center and...more

Holland & Knight LLP

Religious Institutions Update: January 2018 - Lex Est Sanctio Sancta

Holland & Knight LLP on

Timely Topics - By Shannon B. Hartsfield - The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced on Jan. 18, 2018, the creation of a new division within its Office for Civil Rights (OCR). OCR is described as...more

Holland & Knight LLP

Religious Institutions Update: November 2017 - Lex Est Sanctio Sancta

Holland & Knight LLP on

Timely Topics - Serious data breaches have become routine in the United States, yet a recent survey shows that the majority of religious institutions do not have a full-time IT professional, have no system to detect a...more

Hogan Lovells

U.S. Supreme Court Forbids Exclusion of Churches from State Grant Program

Hogan Lovells on

On June 26, 2017, in Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Inc. v. Comer, the U.S. Supreme Court held unconstitutional under the Free Exercise Clause Missouri’s refusal to award a playground resurfacing grant to a church. The...more

Holland & Knight LLP

Supreme Court: Public Benefit Programs Cannot Exclude Churches Solely Because They Are Religious

Holland & Knight LLP on

In Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Inc. v. Comer, No. 15-577 (June 26, 2017), the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 7-2 that excluding a church from a public benefit program for which it is otherwise qualified violates the Free...more

Robinson+Cole RLUIPA Defense

New Jersey Township’s Recently Enacted Ordinances Alleged to Violate RLUIPA

Earlier this month, Agudath Israel of America Inc. (“Agudath Israel”) sued the Township of Jackson, New Jersey (“Jackson”), challenging Jackson’s recently-enacted land use ordinances restricting schools from all but three...more

Holland & Knight LLP

Religious Institutions Update: February 2017

Holland & Knight LLP on

Timely Topics - A draft executive order of President Donald Trump relating to religious freedom proposes several material changes to federal law. First, it would require the executive branches to recognize a broad scope...more

Robinson+Cole RLUIPA Defense

Nashville Islamic Center’s Religious Discrimination Claims Dismissed

A federal district court in Tennessee recently dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction a claim by the Islamic Center of Nashville (ICN) lawsuit challenging a Tennessee property tax exemption law on religious freedom...more

Robinson+Cole RLUIPA Defense

$1.7 Million Settlement with DOJ and CAIR-MI

In 2011, Pittsfield Charter Township denied, allegedly without deliberation, Michigan Islamic Academy’s (“MIA”) application to rezone a 26 acre parcel (the “Property”) to allow the development of a pre-K through grade 12...more

Robinson+Cole RLUIPA Defense

Nashville Islamic Center Claims Tax Rules Impose Unfair Burden

The Islamic Center of Nashville (ICN) recently filed a federal complaint and request for declaratory judgment against the State of Tennessee, the Metropolitan Trustee of Nashville, and the Tennessee State Board of...more

Robinson+Cole RLUIPA Defense

Ocean, NJ ordered to allow Yeshiva boarding school

In January of this year, Yeshiva Gedola Na’os Yaakov, Inc. (the “Yeshiva”) filed a 79-page complaint in federal court against the Township of Ocean, New Jersey, and the Township’s Zoning Board of Adjustment (the “Township)...more

Robinson+Cole RLUIPA Defense

Prevailing RLUIPA Defendant Denied Attorneys’ Fees

This summer, we reported that Genoa Charter Township prevailed in a lawsuit filed by Livingston Christian Schools (LSC), which claimed that the Township violated RLUIPA’s substantial burden provision, the First Amendment to...more

Robinson+Cole RLUIPA Defense

Michigan Township Prevails on Federal Religious Discrimination Claims

A federal court in Michigan has ruled that Genoa Charter Township did not violate federal law in denying a church’s application for a special use permit to operate a religious school. Livingston Christian Schools (LSC)...more

Robinson+Cole RLUIPA Defense

Rhode Island Town Sued for Religious Discrimination

The King’s Tabernacle, a Rhode Island Church with a predominantly African American congregation of 20 members, has sued the Town of Johnston, Rhode Island over the Town’s denial of its special use permit for religious...more

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