The Mississippi legislature
(both houses) yesterday passed the Mississippi Religious Freedom
Restoration Act, a law that would allow citizens to fight back
against state and local regulations that place a burden on the
right to freely practice one’s religion.
The legislation
has already been compared to Arizona’s recent proposal that was
ultimately vetoed by Gov. Jan Brewer. Though the Arizona law never
mentioned sexual orientation, it was clearly a response to
anti-discrimination suits in other states where businesses had
refused to provide goods and services like wedding cakes and
photography to same-sex couples because they had religious
objections to gay marriage. Once again, Mississippi’s law is being
cast as anti-gay legislation.
There is a significant difference here, though. The law that
Mississippi is passing is not as broad as what was proposed in
Arizona and almost perfectly mimics the federal Religious Freedom
Restoration Act, which provides the same guidelines for federal
laws (and is currently part of the debate in
Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby over whether private businesses
can be required to fund contraceptive coverage for employees). You
can compare the Mississippi version
here with the federal version here. Neither bill is
that long or complicated. It states that the government has to
prove that it has a compelling interest in creating any sort of
burden on a person’s practice of religion and prove that this
burden is the least restrictive means of forwarding that interest.
It doesn’t guarantee that individuals or businesses can
discriminate against anybody about whatever they can tie to
religion.
The bill didn’t start off that way, so it should be noted that
parts of the legislation that civil rights groups opposed to were
stripped out to get it passed. Nevertheless, the American Civil
Liberties Union
opposes the bill, continuing its apparent disappointing
position that there’s no such thing as freedom of association.
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