The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty filed a friend-of-the-court brief Wednesday in a case involving teachers’ rights to refuse COVID-19 vaccinations on religious grounds.
The case dates back to 2021, when the St. Louis, Missouri, school board required that educators be vaccinated, though it said exemptions, such as for religious or medical reasons, could be submitted.
Per Becket, the district denied all 198 religious exemption requests but approved all medical exemptions.
“Medical exemptions were rubber-stamped while sincere religious requests were thrown in the trash, forcing faithful teachers out of their classrooms for simply living their beliefs,” Andrea Butler, counsel at Becket, said in a press release. “That discriminatory double standard flouted basic fairness and our nation’s promise of religious freedom.”
Being denied an exemption left many teachers on unpaid leave or fired, resulting in financial hardships and children without access to learning.
The amicus brief filed by Becket says that some teachers were replaced with substitutes who lacked a specialty in the curriculum, other classes were canceled entirely, and, in some cases, students were stripped of the opportunity to receive dual credit because there were no substitutes to fill the role.
A group of teachers ultimately sued, and a judge sided with them, awarding $4 million in damages, but the St. Louis school district appealed to the U.S. 8th Circuit Court, where a hearing is expected later this year.
“Public health uncertainty is not a blank check for government to bulldoze religious freedom,” Butler added. “The Supreme Court made that crystal clear again and again during the pandemic. St. Louis Public Schools should be held fully accountable for its religious discrimination punishing dedicated teachers simply because they chose faith over a government mandate.”