HSLDA Media Release	July 15, 1999

House protects religious liberty—at least when money is at stake

WASHINGTON, D.C. —Today’s House vote in favor of H.R. 1691, the Religious Liberty Protection Act (RLPA), was disappointing but not unexpected, according to Michael Farris, president of the Home School Legal Defense Association. RLPA, a bill with the admirable goal of increasing the legal protection for religious believers to practice their faith, is opposed by a wide range of Christian, conservative and federalist leaders and organizations because of its inappropriate use of the federal ”commerce power.”
    “The vast majority of Republicans in the House of Representatives, including the leadership, proved today that they believe in means justifying ends,” said Farris, who is also President of the new Patrick Henry College. “Conservatives who believe that they can protect religious freedom using the expansive reach of the Commerce Clause—the primary vehicle for every Big Government intrusion into the lives of citizens since the New Deal—cannot expect liberals to resist that same power when their own social agenda is at stake. If the religious beliefs of a home school, a Bible study group or an individual believer constitute interstate commerce, then there is nothing that the federal government cannot control.”
    The good news, according to Farris, is that the Commerce Clause provisions of RLPA run squarely in the face of Supreme Court precedents holding that Congress may not use the commerce power to control the sovereign functions of state government. “Even if RLPA ends up being passed by the Senate and signed by the President,” he noted, “the commerce section will quickly be ruled unconstitutional by the courts. Once that happens, we are eager to work with RLPA’s supporters to implement a real, lasting solution to the problem of religious liberty.”
    Farris was chairman of the drafting committee of the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which was struck down in 1997 by the Supreme Court on different grounds.