Supreme Court hears case that could expand religious rights of workers
Washington — The Supreme Court on Tuesday heard arguments in a case that could reverse a decades-old precedent and expand the rights of workers seeking accommodations from employers due to their religious beliefs.
At the center of the case considered by the justices, known as Groff v. DeJoy, is a 1970s Supreme Court interpretation of a federal civil rights law that said an employer could cite "undue hardship" to deny religious accommodations that it found would impose more than a minimal, or "de minimis," cost on the business.
Though members of the high court's conservative majority appeared more willing to revisit and potentially overturn the 1977 ruling than their liberal colleagues, several justices tried to find "common ground" between two parties in the case: the federal government and a former Postal Service worker who has alleged that his civil rights were violated.
Aaron Streett, the attorney representing Gerald Groff, the former Postal Service worker and evangelical Christian, told the justices his client was unlawfully punished for not working on Sundays to observe Sabbath. Streett urged the court to reverse the 1977 ruling and the "de minimis cost" standard, which he argued gave employers unchecked power to deny religious accommodations by citing trivial business inconveniences.
Instead, the court should require employers to prove that workers' religious accommodations would impose a "significant difficulty or expense" to their businesses in order to deny them, Streett argued.
Representing the government, Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar said that changing the standard of "undue hardship" was a policy question for Congress — not the Supreme Court — to decide. Lower courts rightly concluded, she argued, that Groff had imposed "undue hardship" on the Postal Service with his absences on Sundays, saying one employee quit, another transferred and a third filed a complaint due to Groff's requests.
"Petitioner's job specifically required him to work on Sundays," Prelogar told the justices, saying Groff's absences "created direct, concrete burdens on other carriers who had to stay on their shifts longer to get the mail delivered."
Liberal justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson expressed skepticism about overturning the 46-year precedent, saying that lawmakers have had decades to change the law in question but declined or failed to do so.
"Congress has had a chance to. The ball was in Congress' court. Congress has not done it," Kagan said, citing the "stare decisis" legal principle of generally adhering to precedent-setting rulings.
The conservative justices, however, suggested the "de minimis cost" standard was too expansive and disproportionately preferential to employers. Justice Samuel Alito cited filings in which Muslims, Orthodox Jews, Hindus and Seventh Day Adventists said the current "undue hardship" test violated "their right to religious liberty."
Justice Neil Gorsuch said the "de minimis cost" test was too expansive to be the only standard. "Congress doesn't pass civil rights legislation to have a de minimis effect. We don't think of the civil rights laws as trifling, which is the definition of de minimis," he added.
Still, Gorsuch said the federal government and Groff could find some "common ground." He said both parties agreed that any assessment of "undue hardship" cases needs to be "context-based," weighing the size of the employer, the nature of the accommodation request, the options available to businesses and other factors.
Prelogar said she agreed that the "de minimis cost" test should be used with proper context in mind and that the government would welcome a clarification from the court in that respect. But she said the government is concerned about the high court overturning the 1977 ruling, formulating a new test and reversing decades of case law that is "drawing the right lines."
A decision from the court is expected by the end of June. If the Supreme Court rules in favor of Groff, it would be the latest in a string of rulings expanding religious rights.
Already this term, the court heard arguments in a case involving a Christian graphic designer who does not want to create websites for same-sex weddings. Last year, it sided with a former high school football coach who had been punished for praying on the field after games.
In June, the Supreme Court said that schools that provide religious instruction cannot be excluded from a tuition assistance program offered by the state of Maine. In 2021, it ruled in favor of a Catholic foster care agency in Philadelphia that refused to work with same-sex couples looking to serve as foster parents.
Groff began his career at the Postal Service in 2012 as a Rural Carrier Associate, or a noncareer employee who provides coverage for absent regular carriers on an as-needed basis, according to court filings. Groff observes the Sabbath on Sundays, and his religious beliefs prevent him from working on those days. While this did not pose an issue in his first years working for the Postal Service, that changed after the agency signed an agreement with Amazon in 2013 for Sunday package deliveries in an attempt to remain profitable.
The post office where Groff worked in Quarryville, Pennsylvania, began Amazon Sunday delivery service in 2015, and he was exempted from working Sundays. But in 2016, the Postal Service and the National Rural Letter Carriers' Association entered into a "memorandum of understanding" governing Sunday and holiday schedules, and Groff was informed he'd have to begin working Sunday shifts.
To avoid working on the Sabbath, Groff transferred to a smaller station in Holtwood, Pennsylvania, though that facility began Sunday deliveries in 2017. According to court filings, the postmaster of the Holtwood Post Office refused to exempt Groff from Sunday delivery, but offered to seek volunteers to cover his shifts. Still, Groff ultimately missed 24 shifts when a replacement carrier couldn't be secured to accommodate his absence.
The Postal Service took disciplinary action against Groff in response to his missed shifts and he ultimately resigned from his role in January 2019. Groff filed a lawsuit against the Postal Service, alleging it violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits an employer from discriminating against a worker because of their religion. Under the law, an employer must reasonably accommodate an employee's religious observance unless it entails an "undue hardship" on the business.
A federal district court sided with the Postal Service, and a divided panel of judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit upheld the ruling, finding that "[e]xempting Groff from working on Sundays caused more than a de minimis cost on USPS because it actually imposed on his coworkers, disrupted the workplace and workflow, and diminished employee morale."