Kennedy v. Bremerton School District

Kennedy v. Bremerton School District
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued April 25, 2022 Decided June 27, 2022
Full case name	Joseph A. Kennedy v. Bremerton School District
Docket no.	21-418
Citations	597 U.S. 507 (more) 2022 WL 2295034; 2022 U.S. LEXIS 3218
Argument	Oral argument
Decision	Opinion
Case history
Prior	Preliminary injunction denied, No. 3:16-cv-05694 (W.D. Wash. Sept. 19, 2016) Affirmed, 869 F.3d 813 (9th Cir. 2017) Rehearing en banc denied, 880 F.3d 1097 (9th Cir. 2018) Cert. denied, 139 S. Ct. 634 (2019) Summary judgment granted in favor of school district, 443 F. Supp. 3d 1223 (W.D. Wash. 2020) Affirmed, 991 F.3d 1004 (9th Cir. 2021) Rehearing en banc denied, 4 F.4th 910 (9th Cir. 2021) Cert. granted, 142 S. Ct. 857 (2022)
Holding
The Free Exercise and Free Speech Clauses of the First Amendment protect an individual engaging in a personal religious observance from government reprisal; the Constitution neither mandates nor permits the government to suppress such religious expression.
Court membership
Chief Justice John Roberts Associate Justices Clarence Thomas · Stephen Breyer Samuel Alito · Sonia Sotomayor Elena Kagan · Neil Gorsuch Brett Kavanaugh · Amy Coney Barrett
Case opinions
Majority	Gorsuch, joined by Roberts, Thomas, Alito, Barrett; Kavanaugh (except Part III–B)
Concurrence	Thomas
Concurrence	Alito
Dissent	Sotomayor, joined by Breyer, Kagan
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amend. I

Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, 597 U.S. 507 (2022), is a landmark decision^[1] by the United States Supreme Court in which the Court held, 6–3, that the government, while following the Establishment Clause, may not suppress an individual from engaging in personal religious observance, as doing so would violate the Free Speech and Free Exercise Clauses of the First Amendment.

The case involved Joseph Kennedy, a high school football coach in the public school system of Bremerton, Washington. Kennedy had taken the practice of praying at the middle of the field immediately after each game. The players and others soon joined the practice. The school board were concerned the practice would be seen as infringing on the Establishment Clause separating church and state. They attempted to negotiate with Kennedy to pray elsewhere or at a later time, but Kennedy continued the practice. His contract was not renewed, leading Kennedy to sue the board. Lower Courts, including the Ninth Circuit, ruled in favor of the school board and their argument regarding the Establishment Clause.

The majority opinion from the Supreme Court found that the Establishment Clause does not allow a government body to take a hostile view of religion in considering personal rights under the Free Speech and Free Exercise Clauses, ruling that the board acted improperly in not renewing Kennedy's contract. The decision all but overruled Lemon v. Kurtzman (1971) and abandoned the subsequent "Lemon test", which had been used to evaluate government actions within the scope of the Establishment Clause but had been falling out of favor for decades prior.