Religious Liberty as a Judicial Autoimmune Disorder: The Supreme Court Repudiates its Own Authority in Kennedy v. Bremerton

Abstract

Today’s Supreme Court is so predisposed to find discrimination against religion that it declared it to be present in a case where the discriminator was obeying the Court’s own commands. In Kennedy v. Bremerton, the defendant school district and the lower federal courts had faithfully followed Supreme Court authority. The Court had, until then, consistently insisted that lower courts are bound by Supreme Court precedent. In Kennedy, the Court attacked the basis of its own authority.

Keywords: Religion, First Amendment, Discrimination, Courts, Kennedy v. Bremerton, Neil Gorsuch

JEL Classification: K10, K19, K30, K39, K40, K49