Amendment 1
"The free exercise clause naturally butts up against the establishment clause, creating a healthy balance." - Mark Goldfeder 12L 13L
When Georgia inmate Lester J. Smith wanted to grow an untrimmed beard in accordance with his Muslim faith, the Georgia Department of Corrections said no, and a district court sided with the state.
A judge appointed Mark Goldfeder 12L 13L, director of the Restoring Religious Freedom Project at the Center for the Study of Law and Religion, and Sarah Shalf, professor of practice, to represent Smith on appeal. They took the position that the law in Alabama, Florida, and Georgia was out of sync with the rest of the country. Goldfeder argued the case in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, which ruled unanimously in favor of the plaintiff.
The case, now back in district court, is just one aspect of the far-reaching, four-year Restoring Religious Freedom Project, funded in 2013 by an anonymous $1 million gift. Several students worked on Smith’s case, in keeping with the project’s goal to give students hands-on experience in law and religion practice.
Through the project, students have landed externships at law firms specializing in religious freedom and clerkships with the Supreme Court of Israel. So far, at least two students have turned their externships into jobs.
Students have also worked on amicus briefs for cases around the country, including several US Supreme Court cases, such as Pastor Clyde Reed and Good News Community Church v. City of Gilbert, Arizona, which involved a church that ran afoul of the city over directional signs to its worship services, and Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia v. Comer, which involved a church denied a grant for a playground on religious grounds.
The project has attracted students from across the political spectrum. “Our students work on cases together, take classes together, collaborate, and discuss their views on these issues,” Goldfeder says, adding that he seeks out partnerships with a variety of organizations such as the nonpartisan Religious Freedom Center of the Newseum Institute, which helps educators understand the religious liberty clauses of the First Amendment.
Goldfeder has consulted on Religious Freedom Restoration Act cases nationwide, including assisting with antidiscriminatory language. “Our idea of restoring religious freedom is never about hurting others,” he says. “We build in strong antidiscrimination language, because we must protect the [lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer] community.”
A scholar of family law, Jewish law, and technology, as well as religious freedom, Goldfeder is drawn to the complexity of a right guaranteed in the Constitution but often mired in fear and confusion, which lead to misinterpretation. Goldfeder is fascinated by how other countries and legal systems protect or don’t protect their citizens’ freedom of religion.
“The free exercise clause naturally butts up against the establishment clause, creating a healthy balance,” Goldfeder says. “But too much religious freedom without an establishment clause can lead to extremism and terror.”
Goldfeder visited the United Nations four times to speak on religious freedom. Last year, the project cosponsored an international conference at Emory Law that included Islamic, Jewish, and Christian scholars.
He says, “We’re trying to bring together people of faith and of no faith to have conversations in good faith about the freedom to practice one’s faith.”
