RLUIPA.org
Seventh Circuit Decision in Sts. Helen & Constantine
RLUIPA Experts at The Becket Fund Are Available for Comment
In a unanimous opinion by Judge Richard Posner (PDF format), the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit today issued an important decision under the land use provisions of Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA). Because most litigation on RLUIPA claims so far has been in the trial court, the decision represents the first time that any federal appeals court has found a “substantial burden” under Section 2(a) of the law.
Attorneys at The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty—a nonpartisan, interfaith, public-interest law firm dedicated to protecting the free expression of all religious traditions— are available for comment on this decision. Becket Fund attorneys are the nation’s leading experts on RLUIPA. The firm has been involved in more than 40 RLUIPA cases, both as primary counsel and amicus curiae, on behalf of Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Jews, Muslims, and others. It also runs the www.RLUIPA.org website.
Reversing the district court’s decision, the Seventh Circuit ruled that the defendants in Sts. Constantine and Helen Green Orthodox Church v. City of New Berlin substantially burdened the plaintiffs’ religious exercise by refusing to let the Church use its own land to build a new church. Becket Fund attorneys are available to discuss the issues raised in this and similar RLUIPA cases.
“The burden here was substantial,” Judge Posner wrote, “The Church could have searched around for other parcels of land (though a lot more effort would have been involved in such a search than, as the City would have it, calling up some real estate agents), or it could have continued filing applications with the City, but in either case there would have been delay, uncertainty, and expense. That the burden would not be insuperable would not make it insubstantial.”
Judge Posner also noted that discrimination is often at work in municipalities’ zoning practices. “If a land-use decision, in this case the denial of a zoning variance, imposes a substantial burden on religious exercise… and the decision maker cannot justify it, the inference arises that hostility to religion, or more likely to a particular sect, influenced the decision.”