“Although California’s guidelines place restrictions on places of worship,” Roberts wrote, “those restrictions appear consistent with the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment.”
by Damon Root
Reason.com
The constitutional showdown over coronavirus church restrictions has driven a deep wedge between Chief Justice John Roberts and his fellow Republican appointees on the Supreme Court.
On Friday the Court rejected a California church’s efforts to block the enforcement of a state order that allows shopping malls and certain other businesses to reopen at 50 percent capacity while allowing churches to reopen at just 25 percent capacity. According to the South Bay United Pentecostal Church and its legal team, that differential state treatment violates the religious liberty secured by the First Amendment.