The Utah legislature wrapped up its seven-week legislative session on March 1, 2024. In addition to passing a #MeToo-inspired law prohibiting confidentiality clauses regarding sexual misconduct, the legislature also passed...more
Public school districts across the country face an October 1 deadline to certify they do not prevent constitutionally protected prayer — or else they could lose federal funding. The certification is an annual exercise,...more
In May 2023, the Department of Education issued guidance on the current state of the law regarding constitutionally protected prayer and religious expression in public schools. Last updated in 2020, the guidance incorporates...more
Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, 597 U.S. __ (2022) (The United States Supreme Court concludes that a coach praying at mid-field following a high school football game was engaged in private religious expression...more
Employers Should Reevaluate Policies on Religious Expression at Work in Light of Kennedy v. Bremerton School District and Carson v. Makin - With the commencement of school, public youth programs and 2022-23 budget cycles,...more
The Supreme Court ruled in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District on June 27, 2022 that a public high school violated the Constitution by restricting a football coach from engaging in “personal” but overt post-game, mid-field...more
The Supreme Court addressed the intersection of the First Amendment’s Establishment and Free Speech clauses as they relate to a public employee’s personal religious expression when done in the public eye. In a 6-to-3...more
A school district infringed on an assistant football coach’s rights under the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment when it suspended him for continuing to publicly pray after football games in violation of its policy,...more
The widely reported Supreme Court case Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, No. 21-418 (S. Ct. June 27, 2022) warrants all the attention it has been getting. The Court’s penalty flag against the local Washington school...more
Joseph Kennedy coached football at Bremerton High School, a public school in Washington State. After football games, Kennedy led prayers at the 50-yard line among players, coaches, fans, and, sometimes, politicians. The...more
The U.S. Supreme Court has held in favor of a former high school football coach in western Washington who lost his job after kneeling to pray on the 50-yard line after games. Kennedy v. Bremerton School Dist., No. 21–418...more
On Monday June 27, the Supreme Court issued their ruling in the case Kennedy v. Bremerton School District. (We previously reported on this case.) In a 6-3 decision penned by Justice Neil Gorsuch, the conservative majority...more
Coming off the decisions in the landmark Dobbs and Bruen cases, the rest of the term might seem anticlimactic. Nevertheless, as the shelf is being cleared of the remaining cases, there are still rulings of significance to...more
The U.S. Supreme Court issued a blockbuster school prayer decision Monday in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District. The case involved a public high school football coach who was fired for praying on the field after each game,...more
On June 27, 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court decided Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, No. 21-418, holding that a football coach’s quiet prayers of thanks after three football games were protected under the Free Exercise and...more
On April 25, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, which we previously reported on. As you may recall, the case involves a high school football coach, Joseph Kennedy, who was...more
A Northern District of New York court has permanently enjoined the statewide requirement that employers include a notice of workers’ rights and remedies in their employee handbooks regarding the prohibition on discrimination...more
The Court issued opinions in two cases today, both interesting in their particular factual circumstances, but neither controversial, with one unanimously decided and the other with a lone dissent....more
The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a First Amendment free speech and religious freedom case with potential major implications for all public employers. In Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, the Court will...more
Cassirer v. Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection Foundation, No. 20-1566: Whether a federal court hearing state law claims brought under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act must apply the forum state’s choice-of-law rules to...more
In March, the concept of nominal damages (often just a single dollar awarded to a plaintiff to represent a defendant’s liability in the absence of actual damages) took center stage at the highest courts of both the country...more
In Uzuegbnam v. Preczewski, the Supreme Court held that the award of nominal damages is sufficient to redress a past injury, satisfying Article III’s redressability requirement. While at first blush, the opinion may appear...more
On March 8, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court held in Uzuegbunam v. Preczewski that claims challenging a campus policy on distribution of religious literature were not mooted by the school’s decision to change the policy....more
On March 8, 2021, the Supreme Court decided Uzuegbunam v. Preczewski, No. 19-968, holding that plaintiffs have standing to sue for past injuries fairly traceable to the challenged conduct, even if they seek only nominal...more
In Uzuegbunam v. Preczewski, 592 U.S. ___ (2021), the United States Supreme Court held that plaintiffs asserting constitutional rights have standing to sue for past injuries, even if they only seek nominal damages. The...more