ACS Bay Area: The Legal Trend Towards a Religious Exception for Discrimination

Join the ACS Bay Area Lawyer Chapter for a discussion with Berkeley Law Professor Alan Pomerantz on what's happening to our legal protections against discrimination.

The federal government, certain state governments, and the U.S. Supreme Court are walking back their enforcement of equal treatment regardless of race, sex, gender, citizenship status, sexual identity, or religion. Instead, we are witnessing governmental and judicial support for individual religious and moral beliefs as an acceptable basis to refuse to comply with such mandates.

Such policies have allowed a baker to refuse to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple, a private company to refuse to provide reproductive coverage for its female employees, a pharmacist to refuse to fill a prescription for birth control medication, and a federally funded foster care agency to refuse to deal with Jews, Catholics, and the LGBTQ community. These arguments failed in the 1960’s when employed to attack the Civil Rights Act of 1964, but under the current administration they have begun to succeed.

Join us to learn more about this troubling trend and what to expect going forward.

Featuring:

Alan Pomerantz, UC Berkeley School of Law

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