Post-Enactment Legislative Narrowing of State RFRAs

[Hamilton02 at aol.com]

Along these lines, as the state rfras moved through the states, they became 
 increasingly narrower.  For example, in PA, one of the later rfras, child  
crimes were excluded because prosecutors had figured out this was a 
problem. So  the earliest have few exceptions and actually little debate about 
exceptions in  those states.  The movement ground to a halt when enough groups 
figured out  the laws they had worked to get passed would be at risk with a 
rfra in place,  especially state regulatory agencies charged with protecting 
children.   Similar to the ACLU figuring out at the federal level that a 
re-enacted  RFRA undermined the fair housing laws....
 
Though I was obviously not on the "inside," it was well-known that the  
political play with the rfras was that the religious groups in support had an  
agreement to accept no exceptions.  So another reason the state  rfras 
ground to a halt was that the no-exception approach became  politically 
infeasible.  That stands to reason -- some religious groups are  likely to walk away 
from the table when they find out that others are working  for causes they 
cannot tolerate.   
 
Even more off-point, but still related:  New York right now  is an example 
where religious groups are fighting over issues (child  protection) that 
undermined the feasibility of rfras.   The Catholic Conference has teamed up 
with the ultra-Orthodox Jews to fight  child sex abuse SOL reform, while 
Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform Jews,  along with the National Black Church 
Initiative (34,000 black church  congregations) are standing with the victims. 
 In a new twist, RCC  believers threw coins at the victims at a face-off 
recently.  My point  being that the rfra movement in its infancy was cloaked 
in an appearance of  obvious goodness.  I would expect states with rfras and 
the federal RFRA to  be amended as the cases proliferate.  The Supreme 
Court's decision in O  Centro all but said to the federal government, if you 
don't like the impact of  RFRA on your federal drug laws, it is your fault, with 
the implicit point being  that the federal government certainly can create 
an exception from RFRA for the  federal drug laws, and especially, the most 
dangerous drugs.
 
Marci
 
 
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