Amicus Brief: Missionaries of Saint John the Baptist v. Frederic

Missionaries of Saint John the Baptist is a religious organization in Park Hills, Kentucky, seeking to build a small devotional grotto on its property modeled on the Marian shrine at Lourdes, France. The local zoning board approved the project, but neighboring homeowners challenged the approval. The Kentucky Court of Appeals and Supreme Court ultimately blocked the project.

The Missionaries argue that this violates the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000, or RLUIPA, which Congress enacted to protect religious institutions from discriminatory and overly burdensome land-use regulations. The Kentucky Supreme Court rejected that argument, holding that there was no “substantial burden,” in part because the Missionaries might be able to build a smaller shrine somewhere else on the property.

Now on petition for Supreme Court review, Manhattan Institute and Napa Legal Institute have filed an amicus brief supporting the petitioner. The brief argues that RLUIPA was enacted to prevent local zoning processes from being used to block religious land use. Religious institutions should not be forced to shrink or relocate their religious structures simply because of obstructionist neighbors who invoke zoning laws to stop development.

Courts are divided over what counts as a “substantial burden” in RLUIPA land-use cases. If religious organizations’ RLUIPA claims can be defeated by pointing to hypothetical smaller or alternative uses, the statute loses much of its force. The Supreme Court should grant certiorari and clarify that RLUIPA provides meaningful protection for religious organizations' use of their property.

Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow and director of Constitutional Studies at the Manhattan Institute. Follow him on Twitter here.

Trevor Burrus is a legal policy fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

John Ketcham is a legal policy fellow and director of Cities at the Manhattan Institute.