Attack on free speech, by way of religious discrimination, is getting more aggressive daily

In 1996, a first-grade teacher in New Jersey asked her students to each pick a story to share with their peers. Like his classmates, first grader Zachary Hood went home and did the assignment. On his own, he chose a story from his Beginner’s Bible. But when Zachary proudly showed his choice to his teacher, she said he was not allowed to read his story to the class.

Two hundred years earlier, in 1792, James Madison famously said, “Conscience is the most sacred of all property.” Other forms of property, he explained, rest on laws made by governments.

{mosads}Conscience, on the other hand, is a right that comes from something beyond the powers of government. Conscience is what drives human beings’ inherent thirst for truth. Religious liberty is the right to follow that truth. Like conscience, religious liberty is not granted by government and therefore cannot be restrained or denied by any law.

And yet, governments persist in many forms to carve out, hinder, or take it away, along with our other expressive freedoms.

When we took up Zachary Hood’s case, it was to secure his religious liberty. Zachary’s teacher mistakenly thought that, to be consistent with the Constitution, she had to ban religious speech from the classroom.

Of course, the exact opposite was true, and Zachary ultimately won his case. The victory was a great one for religious liberty. It was equally important for freedom of speech. 

Religious liberty is the cornerstone of our expressive rights; if it’s not intact, then the rest will crumble. This close relationship among our First Amendment rights means that they do not stand alone or in isolation from each other.

This is why Becket often speaks out in cases that focus on freedom of speech, like the recently argued Supreme Court cases Matal v. Tam and Janus v. AFSCME. Religious liberty legal precedents lend support to consequential free speech cases, because religious speech has often been targeted for suppression.

As the Supreme Court weighs in on National Institute of Family and Life Advocates v. Becerra, which I heard earlier last week, and possibly First Resort v. Herrera, we know the opposite is also true: the way free speech cases are decided can have serious implications for religious liberty.

If this surprises you, think about what you see, hear, and read on a daily basis. Think of how quickly individuals who may hold unpopular beliefs are silenced. Even now, Becket is involved in a case where speech and religious liberty are almost inseparable.

The city of San Francisco passed a law targeting a single pregnancy clinic, because the clinic does not offer or refer for abortions, restricting its ability to use basic online advertising tools that are generally marketed and available to any organization.

The attack on free speech, by way of religious discrimination, is getting more aggressive by day. People who want to silence those who disagree with them often use others’ undesirable religious beliefs as an excuse. If they succeed, both religious liberty and freedom of speech are left damaged.

But here’s the good news. Religious liberty is resilient, for exactly the reason that it’s such a target — because it guards “the most sacred of all property.”

Many Americans, including, Native Americans, Christians, Muslims, Sikhs, and Amish communities are some of the many who have stood up for freedom. Nothing but the deepest convictions could give these individuals the courage and stamina to stand up for their rights, often in hostile environments, and often without the expectation of winning. It is conscience that led these everyday heroes to stand up for their rights — and yours.

We need to collectively support religious liberty as the key to all our fundamental rights, for all our sake.

Montse Alvarado is the executive director of Becket, a non-profit law firm based in Washington, D.C. that defends the freedom of religion of people of all faiths. .