Key Cases
COVID-19 Executive Orders Restricting In-Person Worship Upheld
In Calvary Chapel Dayton Valley v. Sisolak, 140 S.Ct. 203 (2020), the U.S. Supreme Court declined to enjoin Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak's emergency order capping in-person services at 50 people regardless of facility size while allowing secular businesses such as casinos to open subject to an occupancy cap of up to 50 percent of the building capacity. Associate Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh dissented, each indicating that at the outset of an emergency it may be appropriate for courts to tolerate blunt rules, but emphasizing that a public health emergency does not give public officials carte blanch to disregard the Constitution.
In Harvest Rock Church, Inc. v. Newsom, No. 20-55907, 2020 WL 5835219 (9th Cir. Oct. 1, 2020), the court ruled that a church failed to demonstrate that the district court abused its discretion by declining to grant the church's motion for preliminary injunction against California Gov. Gavin Newsom's executive order restricting in-person worship during the COVID-19 pandemic. The order precludes in-person worship services in Tier 1 counties; allows 25 percent of building capacity or 100 persons, whichever is fewer, in Tier 2 counties; allows 50 percent of building capacity or 200 persons, whichever is fewer, in Tier 3 counties; and allows 50 percent of building capacity in Tier 4 counties. The court determined that the church failed to show that the orders accord comparable secular activity more favorable treatment than religious activity. Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain dissented: "the State still allows people to go indoors to spend a day shopping in the mall, have their hair styled, get a manicure or pedicure, attend college classes, produce a television show or movie, participate in professional sports, wash their clothes at a laundromat, and even work in a meatpacking plant." But the court ruled that the church failed to rebut the governor's expert, who claimed that the more lenient treatment of certain secular activities such as shopping in a large store is appropriate because it involves less risk.
COVID-19 Executive Order Restricting Wedding Overturned
In Demartile v. Cuomo, No. 1:20-CV-0859, 2020 WL 4558711 (N.D. N.Y. Aug. 7, 2020), the court enjoined an order that placed a 50-person limit on non-essential gatherings, including weddings. The plaintiffs argued that the defendants' expressed interest in preventing the spread of COVID-19 is undermined by multiple facts such as that a restaurant, which is a wedding venue, is permitted to hold more than 50 people at a time when the same venue is used for other purposes. The plaintiffs also argued that similar or more dangerous activities such as mass...
