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Court Opinions ›› Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficente Uniao do Vegetal (2006)
ALBERTO R. GONZALES, ATTORNEY GENERAL, ET AL., PETITIONERS v. O CENTRO ESPIRITA BENEFICENTE UNIAO DO VEGETAL ET AL.
No. 04-1084 SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 546 U.S. 418; 126 S. Ct. 1211; 163 L. Ed. 2d 1017; 2006 U.S. LEXIS 1815; 74 U.S.L.W. 4119; 19 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. S 89 November 1, 2005, Argued February 21, 2006, Decided PRIOR HISTORY: ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT. Congress enacted the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 (RFRA) in response to Employment Div., Dept. of Human Resources of Ore. v. Smith, 494 U.S. 872, 110 S. Ct. 1595, 108 L. Ed. 2d 876, where, in upholding a generally applicable law that burdened the sacramental use of peyote, this Court held that the First Amendment's Free Exercise Clause does not require judges to engage in a case-by-case assessment of the religious burdens imposed by facially constitutional laws, id., at 883-890, 110 S. Ct. 1595, 108 L. Ed. 2d 876. Among other things, RFRA prohibits the Federal Government from substantially burdening a person's exercise of religion, "even if the burden results from a rule of general applicability," 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb-1(a), except when the Government can "demonstrate that application of the burden to the person (1) [furthers] a compelling government interest; and (2) is the least restrictive means of furthering that . . . interest," § 2000bb-1(b). Members of respondent church (UDV) receive communion by drinking hoasca, a tea brewed from plants unique to the Amazon Rainforest that contains DMT, a hallucinogen regulated under Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act, see 21 U.S.C. § 812(c), Schedule I(c). After U.S. Customs inspectors seized a hoasca shipment to the American UDV and threatened prosecution, the UDV filed this suit for declaratory and injunctive relief, alleging, inter alia, that applying the Controlled Substances Act to the UDV's sacramental hoasca use violates RFRA. At a hearing on the UDV's preliminary injunction motion, the Government conceded that the challenged application would substantially burden a sincere exercise of religion, but argued that this burden did not violate RFRA because applying the Controlled Substances Act was the least restrictive means of advancing three compelling governmental interests: protecting UDV members' health and safety, preventing the diversion of hoasca from the church to recreational users, and complying with the 1971 United Nations Convention on Psychotropic Substances. The District Court granted relief, concluding that, because the parties' evidence on health risks and diversion was equally balanced, the Government had failed to demonstrate a compelling interest justifying the substantial burden on the UDV. The court also held that the 1971 Convention does not apply to hoasca. The Tenth Circuit affirmed. We review the District Court's legal rulings de novo and its ultimate decision to issue the preliminary injunction for abuse of discretion.
The courts below did not err in determining that the Government failed to demonstrate, at the preliminary injunction stage, a compelling interest in barring the UDV's sacramental use of hoasca.
It is true, of course, that Schedule I substances such as DMT are exceptionally dangerous.
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For the past 35 years, there has been a regulatory exemption for use of peyote -- a Schedule I substance -- by the Native American Church. See 21 CFR § 1307.31 (2005). In 1994, Congress extended that exemption to all members of every recognized Indian Tribe. See 42 U.S.C. § 1996a(b)(1). Everything the Government says about the DMT in hoasca -- that, as a Schedule I substance, Congress has determined that it "has a high potential for abuse," "has no currently accepted medical use," and has "a lack of accepted safety for use . . . under medical supervision," 21 U.S.C. § 812(b)(1) -- applies in equal measure to the mescaline in peyote, yet both the Executive and Congress itself have decreed an exception from the Controlled Substances Act for Native American religious use of peyote. If such use is permitted in the face of the congressional findings in § 812(b)(1) for hundreds of thousands of Native Americans practicing their faith, it is difficult to see how those same findings alone can preclude any consideration of a similar exception for the 130 or so American members of the UDV who want to practice theirs.
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