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Following the loss of the last Muslim-controlled territory in Spain in 1491, remaining Muslims came under significant pressure to accept baptism and adopt Christian customs. In response to this situation, a North African mufti, believed to be Abu al-Abbas Ahmad ibn Abi Jum'ah al-Maghrawi al-Wahrani, wrote the Oran Fatwa in 1504. The fatwa lauds Muslims in Spain for continuing to practice their religion in the face of oppression. It also specifies ways in which Muslims may alter the ways they carry out the commands of Islam in order to ensure their survival.

The Plaintiff Nathaniel Hallman, a federal prisoner at the Lexington County Detention Center and an observing Muslim, brought this suit against the Respondents, Trinity Food Group, the Sheriff of Lexington County and several sheriff employees, for allegedly refusing to provide adequate and appropriate meals during Ramadan. The Respondents filed for summary judgment, asserting that the Ramadan meals provided to Muslim inmates were adequate. The Magistrate judge found that the prisoner requested to participate in Ramadan, during which members of the Islamic faith fasted during daylight hours. The detention center inmates observing Ramadan were not served a meal during the lunch period, but are provided a breakfast meal before sunrise and a dinner meal after sunset. The Magistrate judge recommended that the motions for summary judgment should be granted because the menu served to the inmates observing Ramadan was approved by a licensed dietician to ensure that the menu met those inmates' caloric and nutritional needs.

Plaintiff Mitchell Theophilus Garraway filed an action against the Respondent, a Lewisburg penitentiary, for a claimed violation of RLIUPA. The Plaintiff alleged that various Federal Bureau of Prisons rules and policies severely and unnecessarily burden his right to private religious exercise of his Islamic faith. The Plaintiff cited, among other reasons, that the prison did not make the chapel available to all Muslims to congregate for Friday prayer, and also placed other restrictions on Muslims’ ability to perform all their prayers together as one group. The District Court decided that the penitentiary had a legitimate governmental interest—the need to maintain order and security—that was rationally connected to the policy regarding congregation for prayer. 

Plaintiff Kareem Hassan Milhouse, an inmate at the United States Penitentiary in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania (“USP-Lewisburg”), filed aBivens-styled complaint against several Federal Bureau of Prisons and USP-Lewisburg officials. The Plaintiff asserted that he had been denied access to the courts on three occasions and denied the practice of his religious requirements in violations of his right to free exercise, on the bases that: (1) there was no Islamic chaplain for Muslim inmates nor services for Special Management Unit inmates to attend services physically, nor were services provided through the radio as were other institutional programs, and (2) there was no Islamic celebration after the Ramadan fast, nor special meal of the types given for holidays of other faiths, and no Muslim chaplain with whom to discuss articles of faith. [He believed both of these types of services to be requirements stipulated by Islamic ritual law.] The Defendants filed a motion to dismiss and for summary judgment. The District Court granted the Defendants’ motion for summary judgment. The Court found that the alleged conduct did not fall within the scope of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (“RFRA”), which applies to free exercise of religion claims under the First Amendment raised by prisoners, because the Plaintiff did not establish that a “substantial burden” had been placed on his ability to exercise his religion. The Court further determined that the Plaintiff had alternative means of worship available to him and that the Defendants’ conduct of providing the meal to non-Muslim inmates did not inhibit or curtail his ability to express adherence to his Islamic faith and beliefs. Because the Plaintiff failed to meet the substantial burden test with respect to both of these freedom of religion claims, the Court granted summary judgment in favor of the Defendants.

Plaintiff Sturgeon Stewart, an inmate at the Kansas Department of Corrections (KDOC) brought suit against Respondents Vernestene Dulin, head of prison food services, and various other prison officials for alleged violations of his rights to religious free exercise on the claim that the prison served Muslim inmates the same ḥalāl food menu for all meals of the day, and that these meals excluded meat. Ḥalāl food is meat prepared in accordance with Islamic ritual law, and free of pork and alcohol. The Plaintiff contended that this repetition was not a nutritional religious-accommodating alternative to regular prison meals. The Court found for the Respondents, determining that Muslim prisoners do not have a right under the First Amendment or the RLUIPA to be provided ḥalāl meat entrees. Rather, a correctional facility need only provide Muslim prisoners with food that is not ḥarām (prohibited under Islamic law). The Court found that, as long as the Plaintiff was given an alternative to eating non-ḥalāl meat, he did not suffer a substantial burden to his religious beliefs. The Court determined that the Plaintiff had been provided with alternatives to non-ḥalāl meat, but that the Plaintiff was “simply not happy with the substitutions offered.” Therefore, the Court concluded that the Plaintiff’s factual allegations, construed as true, failed to establish a violation of the Plaintiff’s federal rights.

The Court affirmed a decision by the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin, granting summary judgment in favor of the plaintiff, Jerry Charles, who alleged a violation of his rights under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) to practice his religion. Specifically, the plaintiff requested accommodations that would allow him to have prayer oil, which he contended was a necessary part of his religious practice. The Department of Corrections challenged RLUIPA as unconstitutional, but the Court upheld the constitutionality of the statute.

Plaintiff Daniel O’Neil Ruffin, the only practicing Muslim in the Downeast Correctional Facility in Machiasport, Maine, brought this suit against the Respondents, facility program manager Carol Geel, facility director Scott Jones, and former commissioner of the Maine Department of Corrections Martin Magnusson for allegedly violating his First Amendment rights by denying his request to be allowed to conduct religious services in the common area. The Respondents claimed that they denied the request because it would have been impracticable to assign an officer to supervise a single prisoner, and that they tried to accommodate the Plaintiff’s religious beliefs by allowing him to conduct services in his room. The Respondents filed a motion for summary judgment, which the Court referred to a Magistrate judge for a recommended decision. The Magistrate judge recommended that the Respondents be entitled to qualified immunity because a reasonable officer would not have known that the challenged conduct violated the Plaintiff’s rights.

Plaintiff Jim Davis challenged a prison policy that imposed a temporary, total ban on the purchase and receipt of prayer oil as a violation of both his First Amendment and RLUIPA rights. The Respondents, the prison administration and various officers individually named in the complaint, counterclaimed that a ban on prayer oils furthered a legitimate government interest, as prayer oils posed a fire, health, and safety hazard. The Plaintiff alleged in a second claim against the Respondents that they retaliated against him for filing a grievance regarding this prison policy by restricting the purchase of religious items to the quarterly packages he could receive while incarcerated. The Respondents filed a motion to dismiss. The District Court determined that the Plaintiff stated a cognizable First Amendment and RLUIPA violation with respect to the prayer oil ban, because the Plaintiff sufficiently showed that the prayer oils were not flammable and therefore did not pose a risk. The District Court granted the motion to dismiss with regard to the second claim because the District Court determined that restricting religious items to the quarterly packages did not sufficiently burden his practice of religion, as he was not denied all access to prayer oil and was still allowed to order oil in quarterly packages.

Plaintiff Andre Harvey, a Muslim inmate at the David Wade Correctional Center, filed this action against the Respondent, Chaplain Ray Anderson, for allegedly removing the Plaintiff from the list on inmates approved to receive a religious diet and for denying him access to the Islamic community chapel. The Respondent filed a motion for summary judgment, and the Plaintiff did not file any response.  The Magistrate judge determined that the Respondent did not remove the Plaintiff from the list without cause, but instead that the Plaintiff himself failed to attend Friday prayer services and continued to not attend religious events, thereby warranting his removal from a list of Muslim inmates. The Magistrate judge therefore recommended that the motion for summary judgment be granted, and the complaint be dismissed with prejudice.

Plaintiff Horace Crump, an inmate in the Michigan Department of Corrections, brought this compliant against the Respondent, Deputy Warden Winn at the Saginaw Correctional Facility, for changing the Muslim prayer time. Specifically, the Plaintiff alleged that the Respondent changed the Muslim prayer time in such a way as to place a substantial burden on the Plaintiff’s free exercise of his religion, and that this was done in retaliation for having complained about his and other Muslim inmates’ complaints during Ramadan. The Respondent filed a motion for summary judgment, and the case was referred for a report and recommendation by a magistrate judge. The magistrate judge determined that the Plaintiff did not suffer a substantial burden, because while the Respondent did not offer a specific penological justification for changing the prayer time, the prison immediately reinstated the religiously required Friday prayer time, such that the Plaintiff did not in fact suffer a “substantial burden” on the practice of his religion. The magistrate judge then found that the fact that the Plaintiff did not suffer a substantial burden on the practice of his religion also showed that he did not suffer adverse action, a necessary element of his retaliation claim. For these reasons, the magistrate judge recommended that the Respondent’s motion for summary judgment be granted, and that the complaint be dismissed with prejudice.

Plaintiff William C. McKinnedy, a South Carolina inmate, brought this suit against the Respondents, over 30 South Carolina Department of Corrections (“SCDC”) staff members and state government officials, alleging that the Respondents violated his religious beliefs by 1) refusing to provide a food tray prior to sun-up during Ramadan; and 2) not allowing the Plaintiff to attend the Eid feast at the conclusion of Ramadan. The Respondents filed a motion for summary judgment, stating that on multiple occasions the Plaintiff informed the Chaplain that he did not consider himself part of the Muslim community. The Magistrate Court granted summary judgment for the Defendants, determining that the Defendants’ refusal to allow the Plaintiff to participate in Ramadan was related to a legitimate penological interest, such as security concerns.

Prison inmate Lawrence Cochran filed a §1983 claim against prison officials for allegedly violating his First Amendment rights by not allowing him to have food in his cell at night to break the Ramadan fast and by limiting his attendance of religious services. The Court granted the motion for summary judgment in favor of the defendants, holding that incarceration necessarily curtails some freedom, and that, in this context, the curtailment did not go so far as to place a substantial burden on Muslim inmates’ ability to practice their religion.

Plaintiff Jesse Copeland, an inmate of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, brought suit after he refused to leave a Muslim religious meeting after prison officials ordered the meeting’s conclusion and was disciplined for causing a disturbance and placed on disciplinary restrictions, including a six-month ban on attending other religious meetings. The Plaintiff filed a complaint in the District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, challenging the ban and other prison policies impacting Muslim inmates. The District Court dismissed the complaint and granted summary judgment for the Respondents, prison officials at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. The Fifth Circuit affirmed the District Court’s judgment. The Fifth Circuit determined that there was no First Amendment free exercise violation under § 1983 nor a  violation of the Plaintiff’s rights under RLUIPA based on the Plaintiff’s six-month ban from attending religious meetings due to procedural bars to the Plaintiff’s recovery, including sovereign immunity, qualified immunity, and mootness.

Plaintiff William Welch claimed the Saginaw Correctional Facility violated his First Amendment right to free exercise of religion by providing meals that provided insufficient nutrition and calories. The appellate court agreed that Welch had demonstrated a potential violation of his constitutional rights, and affirmed the district court's earlier denial of qualified immunity to the defendants. 

Plaintiff Hilton Karriem Mincy, a Muslim prisoner at the Lycoming County Prison, brought this suit against the Respondents – the county prison, the prison warden and other prison officials – alleging that the prison’s inadequate food service during Ramadan, which included no hot meals at the end of the day and evening meals of insufficient caloric content to compensate for the absence of a daytime meal, constituted a failure to accommodate his religious beliefs and a violation of the RLUIPA. The U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania entered summary judgment in favor of the Respondents, and the Plaintiff appealed. The Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment of the District Court. The Court of Appeals determined that the Plaintiff identified no official policy promulgated by the prison administration which violated his constitutional rights, and there was no evidence to suggest that any named Respondent played a direct role or had any personal involvement in the preparation or storage of food.

The Plaintiff, Muslim prisoner Davis Totten, brought this civil rights claim against employees of Ryan Correctional Facilities alleging religious discrimination. The Plaintiff claimed that the Respondents violated his First Amendment right to religious freedom because they 1) threatened the Plaintiff with disciplinary action if he attended the Friday (jumuʿa) prayer service, the Islamic study class (taʿlīm) or any Islamic seminar while on a work or school assignment; 2) tried to control how Muslims appoint their spiritual leader for the Friday prayer services; and 3) failed to make preparations for the Eid al-Aḍḥā prayer service, among other alleged offenses. The Respondents filed a motion for summary judgment, on the claim that they are entitled to qualified immunity. The Magistrate Judge recommended that the Respondents’ motion be granted in part and denied in part. On the first issue, the Magistrate Judge determined that the Respondents were entitled to qualified immunity, because the Plaintiff did not meet his burden of convincing the Court that it was clearly established law that an official’s failure to allow prisoners to attend the Friday prayer service, the Islamic study class, or any Islamic seminar violate the First Amendment right to practice religion. The Magistrate Judge found the Respondents entitled to summary judgment on the second issue, because the Magistrate Judge found that the plaintiff did not indicate that any prison officials actually appointed an inadequate spiritual leader who interfered with his right to practice his religion. On the third issue, the Magistrate Judge determined that the Respondents were not entitled to summary judgment on qualified immunity grounds on this claim, because the Plaintiff presented sufficient evidence to demonstrate that his ability to attend the Eid al-Aḍḥā prayer service—which is mandated by his religion and is a “sincerely held” practice—had been infringed upon, and was not related to a legitimate penological interest.

The Plaintiffs, Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) prisoners Eric Dowdy, Averis X Wilson, Roger Hunt, Amira Salem, Tom Traini, Patricia L. Caruso, Dave Burnett, and Michael Martin, alleged that the Defendants, various MDOC employees, violated their rights under federal and state constitutional provisions and RLUIPA by unlawfully restricting their religious practices. Specifically, the Plaintiffs challenged the Respondents’ alleged failure to accommodate certain religious practices which they claimed must be observed during particular days and times each week. The Muslim Plaintiffs specifically challenged that the inability to attend Friday (jumuʿa) prayer services without obtaining permission to exercise a “call-out”—permission which is often denied—violated their federal and state constitutional rights. The Muslim Plaintiffs also challenged the Respondents’ alleged failure to accommodate their religious dietary restrictions and their observance of the Eid al-Fīṭr and Eid al-Aḍḥā feasts. In response to the first allegation, the Respondents claim that there is a legitimate governmental interest in prison security that would be compromised if inmates were allowed to attend prayer services. The District Court determined, however, that while a legitimate governmental interest existed, the restriction of prayer services was not the least restrictive means of protecting this compelling interest in prison security. Accordingly, the District Court did not grant summary judgment in response to the Plaintiffs’ Friday prayer claim. In response to the second allegation, the Court determined that failure to provide Muslim inmates with a ḥalāl diet substantially burdens a religious exercise, but found that a question of fact exists as to whether the Plaintiffs received such a diet.

Plaintiff Jack Robinson, a formerly incarcerated inmate at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn (“MDC”), brought an action against Respondent, Officer Jimminez, a correctional officer at MDC, for allegedly depriving the Plaintiff of his right to religious worship under the First Amendment. The Plaintiff claimed that, although he reserved the prison’s religious room for Friday prayer (jumuʿa) services, the Respondent allowed Jewish prisoners to also use the room. The Respondent argued that the Plaintiff’s religious service was “stopped due to a scheduling conflict with another group of inmates who had also reserved the religious room for the same time as plaintiff.” The Respondent moved for summary judgment, and the district court judge referred the Respondent’s motion to a magistrate judge for a report and recommendation. The magistrate judge determined that the Respondent’s decision to stop one religious service was reasonably related to legitimate penological interests because the action was undertaken to maintain order and prevent an altercation between Muslim and Jewish prisoners, and therefore recommended that the Respondent’s motion for summary judgment be granted.

Plaintiff Charles Glenn, an inmate at the New Hampshire Department of Corrections (DOC) filed suit against the Respondents, various DOC prison officials, for alleged violations of his rights to free exercise [of his ability to exercise Islamic ritual law] under the First Amendment and RLUIPA. Specifically, the Plaintiff – a practicing Muslim – argued that there had been no Friday prayer (jumuʿa) services at the New Hampshire State Prison for the past three years and that he had no access to an Imam (a Muslim prayer leader), a Qur’an, or other Islamic literature, which placed constraints on his ability to practice Islam [specifically, it's ritual law aspects]. In conducting a Preliminary Review, the Court applied the four-part test for examining the constitutionality of a regulation that restricts an inmate’s First Amendment free exercise of religion found in Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78, 89-90 (1987). The Court assessed the four Turner factors -- (1) whether there is a valid, rational connection between the regulation and the legitimate government interest put forward to justify it; (2) whether alternative means to exercise the right exist; (3) what impact accommodating the right will have on prison resources; and (4) whether there was an absence of alternatives to the prison regulation. The Court found that the prison’s policy of denying Friday Prayer (jumuʿa) services, which are a central and essential element of religious practice, impinged on the Plaintiff’s First Amendment right to exercise his religion.

Holding: To prevail in a disparate-treatment claim, an applicant need show only that his need for an accommodation was a motivating factor in the employer’s decision, not that the employer had knowledge of his need. 

Judgment: Reversed and remanded, 8-1, in an opinion by Justice Scalia on June 1, 2015. Justice Alito filed an opinion concurring in the judgement. Justice Thomas filed an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part.

Facts: Respondent (Abercrombie) refused to hire Samantha Elauf, a practicing Muslim, because the headscarf that she wore pursuant to her religious obligations conflicted with Abercrombie’s employee dress policy. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) filed suit on Elauf’s behalf, alleging a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which, inter alia, prohibits a prospective employer from refusing to hire an applicant because of the applicant’s religious practice when the practice could be accommodated without undue hardship.

Procedural Posture: The EEOC prevailed in the District Court, but the Tenth Circuit reversed, awarding Abercrombie summary judgment on the ground that failure-to-accommodate liability attaches only when the applicant provides the employer with actual knowledge of his need for an accommodation.

Sources: Opinion Syllabus; SCOTUSblog Case Page (with further reviews and commentary on the U.S. law implications of this case).