The Upside-Down Treatment of Religious Exceptions Cases in the Supreme Court

MICHAEL C. DORF

Cornell law professor Michael C. Dorf comments on the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last week to reject an emergency application from the State of Alabama to lift a stay on the execution of Willie B. Smith III. Professor Dorf observes the Court’s unusual alignment of votes in the decision and argues that, particularly as reflected by the recent COVID-19 decisions, the liberal and conservative Justices have essentially swapped places from the seminal 1990 case Employment Division v. Smith, which established that the First Amendment does not guarantee a right to exceptions from neutral laws of general applicability.

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Rohe v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A.

Docket: 19-13947

Opinion Date: February 18, 2021

Judge: Tjoflat

Areas of Law: Bankruptcy, Civil Procedure

Petitioner filed suit alleging that, after she filed for bankruptcy, Wells Fargo violated the automatic bankruptcy stay by continuing with foreclosure proceedings against her in the Florida state courts. Furthermore, Wells Fargo and the state courts acted contrary to federal law governing removal by continuing with the same state court proceedings after petitioner sought to remove the state case to the bankruptcy court. Petitioner filed a petition for a writ under the All Writs Act in the district court, seeking an order declaring that certain actions of the state courts were void and granting her damages against Wells Fargo and its counsel. The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal of plaintiff's complaint, finding that this case is not the kind of case in which an order under the Act could properly be issued because there is no underlying proceeding over which the district court has jurisdiction and the integrity of which the district court would be in an appropriate position to protect by making such an order. In this case, dismissal was proper because the Act does not empower the district court to issue the order sought by the petition.

Camarena v. Director, Immigration and Customs Enforcement

Dockets: 19-13446, 19-14331

Opinion Date: February 18, 2021

Judge: Grant

Areas of Law: Immigration Law

In these consolidated appeals, plaintiffs, two immigrants who admit that they are subject to valid removal orders, filed suit alleging that the government cannot remove them because that would interfere with their "regulatory rights" to remain in the United States while they apply for waivers. The Eleventh Circuit concluded that plaintiffs' applications do not give the court subject matter jurisdiction to interfere with the execution of their removal orders. The court explained that plaintiffs' claims fall squarely within 8 U.S.C. 1252(g)'s jurisdictional bar where the action being challenged is the government's execution of plaintiffs' removal orders. In this case, section 1252(g) strips the court of jurisdiction to hear the claims brought by plaintiffs, and the statute does not offer any discretion-versus-authority distinction of the sort they claim. Because Congress stripped federal courts of jurisdiction over such claims, the court affirmed the district court's dismissals.