About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

1993 BYU L. Rev. 221 (1993)
The Religious Freedom Restoration Act

handle is hein.journals/byulr1993 and id is 231 raw text is: The Religious Freedom Restoration Act Douglas Laycock* I. INTRODUCTION The proposed Religious Freedom Restoration Act' (RFRA) is a legislative response to the Supreme Court's decision in Employment Division v. Smith,2 which held that federal courts cannot protect the exercise of religion from formally neutral and generally applicable laws. In effect, the Court held that every American has a right to believe in a religion, but no right to practice it. Religion cannot be singled out for discriminatory regulation, but it is fully subject to the entire body of secular regulation. In a pervasively regulated society, Smith means that religion will be pervasively regulated. In a society where regulation is driven by interest group politics, Smith means that churches will be embroiled in endless political battles with secular interest groups. In a nation that sometimes claims to have been founded for religious liberty, Smith means that Americans will suffer for conscience. RFRA would greatly ameliorate these consequences. The bill would enact a statutory version of the Free Exercise Clause. The bill can work only if it is as broad as the Free Exercise Clause, establishing the fundamental principle of religious liberty and leaving particular disputes to further litigation. Introduced with bipartisan sponsorship in both Houses of Congress, supported by President Clinton, and endorsed by its most influential former opponent, the United States Catholic Conference, RFRA may finally be on the way to passage after * Alice McKean Young Regents Chair in Law and Associate Dean for Research, The University of Texas Law School. The author participated in the drafting of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and testified in support of the Act before committees in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. 1. S. 578 & H.R. 1308, 103d Cong., 1st Sess. (1993), available in LEXIS, Legis Library, BLTEXT File. 2. 494 U.S. 872 (1990). 221

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Purchase Access

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Contact Us

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most