A federal judge has ruled Gov. JB Pritzker’s pledge to never again impose COVID-related gathering restrictions on churches and other houses of worship – together with Pritzker’s refusal to do so for more than a year – is enough to block a Chicago church from continuing its pursuit of a court order expressly barring the governor from ever ordering churches closed again in the name of public health.
Attorneys representing the congregation, however, wasted no time in filing notice that they intend to appeal that decision, arguing the courts are allowing Pritzker to allegedly violate religious freedom rights, and just walk away.
Mat Staver
| Liberty University
The congregation has fought with Pritzker and his lawyers from the Illinois Attorney General’s Office for more than a year in federal courts in Chicago, and before the U.S. Supreme Court.
The church has asserted Pritzker violated the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution last spring, when he issued emergency orders limiting churches and other houses of worship to assemblies of no more than 10 people, in the name of fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.
The restrictions were issued as part of Pritzker’s broader, sweeping actions to restrict social and business activities throughout Illinois, citing emergency powers under state law to address what he declared to be a statewide public health disaster.
Since first imposing the restrictions via emergency order in March 2020, Pritzker has applied, tightened, eased or removed various restrictions at various points, as he deemed warranted. Neither the Illinois General Assembly nor the courts have taken any action to limit or wrest those emergency powers from him.
The governor has yet to rescind the statewide disaster declaration, but has instead redeclared disasters every 30 days, as he has interpreted the state’s emergency management law to require. Courts have upheld that interpretation, and shot down challenges to his ability to continue issuing emergency declarations without limit.
Pritzker has also faced legal challenges from churches, most notably, from the Elim congregation.
To this point, judges in Illinois state and federal courts have almost unanimously upheld Pritzker’s powers and his orders, even against churches. They have brushed aside concerns over religious freedom, saying the severity of the COVID pandemic allows the governor to infringe constitutional rights, until the governor alone may declare the disaster has passed.
Federal judges have maintained that position in Illinois, even after the U.S. Supreme Court has issued a series of unprecedented rulings, striking down similar worship gathering restrictions in New York, California and elsewhere.
However, in late May 2020, facing a potential date with the U.S. Supreme Court, Pritzker opted to rescind the orders restricting religious gatherings, replacing them with so-called public health guidelines and recommendations for religious assemblies to follow.
Because of those changes and those promises, Pritzker has argued the courts should now consider Elim’s lawsuit to be “moot.”
Elim’s lawyers, with the nonprofit religious freedom advocacy group Liberty Counsel, of Orlando, Fla., argued the case is not moot, because Pritzker, while pledging to not reimpose such restrictions on churches, has also continued to argue he retains the constitutional authority to do so.
Elim has argued an order from a federal court is required to explicitly declare the governor overstepped his bounds, trampled on religious liberty and cannot do so again, even if he believes public health requires such restrictions.
Gettleman, however, said he believes Pritzker’s refusal to reimpose restrictions on churches has effectively ended any constitutional concerns over the governor’s potential use of emergency powers against religious congregations.
“… The COVID-19 order restricting religious activities ended in May 2020, over 15 months ago,” Gettleman wrote. “And despite plaintiffs’ arguments to the contrary, there is no credible threat of reinstatement. Again, during the surges of COVID cases in the fall of 2020 and winter of 2021 - when a vaccine was not readily available - the state did not attempt to reinstate its orders on religious activities at all.
“Illinois did not ‘move the goalpost’ for religious activities during the worst months of the pandemic. There is no reason to assume it would do so now, when 49% of Illinoisans are fully vaccinated, the state has fully reopened, and the pandemic appears to be under control,” the judge said.
He also said the Supreme Court decisions from New York and California have no bearing on Illinois’ situation, because those cases involved restrictions that were still in place, while Pritzker had lifted Illinois’ restrictions and has not sought to reimpose them.
In a statement following the ruling, Elim’s counsel said the recent focus, by federal and state health officials, on the rise of the Delta variant of the COVID virus indicates public health officials may not share Gettleman’s opinion on the state of the pandemic.
That, they said, raises the specter of potential restrictions looming in coming days and weeks in response to rising COVID case counts and hospitalizations.
Liberty Counsel said they intended to appeal Gettleman’s decision to the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago.
“Gov. JB Pritzker has abused and intentionally discriminated against these Romanian churches while providing preferential treatment to many secular businesses and gatherings,” said Mat Staver, Liberty Counsel founder and chairman, in a prepared statement.
“It is time to shut the door so he must never be allowed to extend his dictatorial hand again. It is time to permanently quarantine these discriminatory restrictions.”