Freedom of religion is paramount among American liberties, but can a business require an employee to work on Sunday if it goes against that person’s faith? The Supreme Court will hear arguments today regarding how far employers must go to accommodate individual religious practices.
The High Court is expected to rule on the case in June, addressing whether federal anti-discrimination Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits employment discrimination based on religion and other factors, including race, sex and national origin, holds water in this case. Also, according to court records, the court will consider the case in light of a 1977 ruling that looked at whether a religious accommodation would cause more than negligible cost to the company’s operations.
The case in front of the Supreme Court involves a former mail carrier in Pennsylvania, Gerald Groff, who accuses the US Postal Service of religious discrimination for refusing to exempt him from working on Sundays in accordance with his evangelical Christian beliefs. Groff says he was disciplined for repeatedly failing to show up when he was assigned a Sunday work shift once the postal service started offering Sunday deliveries for Amazon.
Groff “was forced to choose between his work as a mail carrier and his religious practice. He resigned and sued the Postal Service for discrimination,” the Washington Post reported. First Liberty Institute, a nonprofit Christian conservative legal organization based in Plano, TX, is representing Groff in the lawsuit.
According to the news outlet, Groff now coordinates and oversees mail delivery at a large retirement community.
Religious groups of multiple faiths submitted friend-of-the-court briefs in support of overturning the 1977 ruling, claiming that they, too, have been adversely affected.
Those submitting the briefs “are deeply concerned by the ability of employers to discriminate against those requiring accommodations — including discrimination in such a manner that allows for segregation, failure to hire, and situations creating a retaliatory or hostile work environment — and how such discrimination disproportionately affects minority communities by failing to provide for equal access to employment opportunities,” the Sikh Coalition, Muslim advocates and the Religious Freedom Action Team wrote in a joint filing. “The issues at stake in this case relate directly to the right of practitioners of minority faiths in America to avail themselves of employment opportunities on equal terms.”
Meanwhile, unions, including one representing postal workers, are backing the Post Office in this case, in part because accommodating one person’s religious practices may burden other employees.
“A day off is not the special privilege of the religious,” the American Postal Workers Union AFL-CIO said in a brief. “Days off, especially on the weekend, are when parents can spend the day with children who are otherwise in school, when people can spend time on the other necessities of life, when the community enjoys a common day of rest for churchgoers and the nonreligious alike.
