Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. Hialeah, 508 U.S. 520, 44 (1993)

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Cite as: 508 U. S. 520 (1993)

Opinion of Souter, J.

for government neutrality if it unduly burdens the free exercise of religion." Id., at 896 (opinion of O'Connor, J., joined by Brennan, Marshall, and Blackmun, JJ.) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). The rule these Justices saw as flowing from free-exercise neutrality, in contrast to the Smith rule, "requir[es] the government to justify any substantial burden on religiously motivated conduct by a compelling state interest and by means narrowly tailored to achieve that interest." Id., at 894 (emphasis added).

The proposition for which the Smith rule stands, then, is that formal neutrality, along with general applicability, are sufficient conditions for constitutionality under the Free Exercise Clause. That proposition is not at issue in this case, however, for Hialeah's animal-sacrifice ordinances are not neutral under any definition, any more than they are generally applicable. This case, rather, involves the noncontroversial principle repeated in Smith, that formal neutrality and general applicability are necessary conditions for free-exercise constitutionality. It is only "this fundamental non-persecution principle of the First Amendment [that is] implicated here," ante, at 523, and it is to that principle that the Court adverts when it holds that Hialeah's ordinances "fail to satisfy the Smith requirements," ante, at 532. In applying that principle the Court does not tread on troublesome ground.

In considering, for example, whether Hialeah's animal-sacrifice laws violate free-exercise neutrality, the Court rightly observes that "[a]t a minimum, the protections of the Free Exercise Clause pertain if the law at issue discriminates against some or all religious beliefs or regulates or prohibits conduct because it is undertaken for religious reasons," ibid., and correctly finds Hialeah's laws to fail those standards. The question whether the protections of the Free Exercise Clause also pertain if the law at issue, though nondiscriminatory in its object, has the effect nonetheless of placing a burden on religious exercise is not before the Court

563

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