Facts
- Massachusetts enforced a Sunday closing statute prohibiting most retail operations and business labor on “the Lord’s day,” subject to numerous statutory exceptions.
- One exception permitted limited Sunday sales of kosher meat (generally between 6:00 a.m. and 10:00 a.m.) for sellers who, for religious reasons, observed Saturday as the Sabbath.
- Crown Kosher Super Market in Springfield, Massachusetts, was owned and patronized by Orthodox Jews who observed the Sabbath from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday and required kosher food.
- The market closed for the Jewish Sabbath but traditionally opened on Sundays and claimed that limiting Sunday operations to the statutory window was economically impractical.
- Police made deliberate Sunday purchases at the store on three Sundays in 1954; an owner was convicted under the Sunday closing law and fined.
- The market, its owners, and Orthodox Jewish customers and rabbis sued state and local enforcement officials in federal court, alleging violations of the Establishment Clause, Free Exercise Clause, Due Process, and Equal Protection.
- A three-judge federal district court enjoined enforcement, reasoning that the complex set of exceptions rendered the regime constitutionally defective; state officials appealed directly to the Supreme Court.
Issues
- Whether Massachusetts’ Sunday closing law, as applied to an Orthodox Jewish kosher market and its patrons, violates the Establishment Clause or Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment (as applied to the states).
- Whether the statute’s structure and numerous exemptions deny Equal Protection or Due Process under the Fourteenth Amendment by imposing distinctive burdens on Orthodox Jews and kosher businesses.
Decision
- The Supreme Court reversed the district court and upheld the challenged Sunday closing provisions.
- Six Justices agreed the law did not violate the Establishment Clause or the Free Exercise Clause as applied.
- The Court also rejected the Equal Protection challenge despite the statute’s many exceptions.
- No single opinion commanded a majority; the result rested on a plurality opinion and a separate concurrence, with two dissents.
Legal Principles
- A Sunday closing law may be upheld when its contemporary purpose and primary effect are secular (e.g., providing a common day of rest), even if the law has religious origins or terminology.
- A generally applicable regulation of commercial conduct that only incidentally burdens religious practice does not necessarily “prohibit” the free exercise of religion under the First Amendment.
- Substantial economic disadvantage to religious observers, without more, may be treated as an incidental burden rather than unconstitutional coercion when the law regulates secular activity and is not directed at religious exercise.
- Under rational-basis review, a legislature may adopt and refine multiple exceptions in a Sunday closing scheme; such classifications do not violate Equal Protection unless they are invidious or wholly arbitrary.
Conclusion
The Court held that Massachusetts could enforce its Sunday closing law against an Orthodox Jewish kosher supermarket despite significant practical and economic burdens, concluding the statute served a secular common-rest objective, did not establish religion, and did not deny equal protection through its exemptions.