Supreme Court Declares: ‘Churches In New York Do Not Need To Follow Cuomo’s Anti-Covid Restrictions’
But less stringent capacity restrictions, also rejected by the Supreme Court’s decision, are still in place in six other counties, including in Staten Island.
After Mr. Cuomo’s remarks, Beth Garvey, his legal counsel, said that the state believed the court’s opinion affected only the now-lapsed restrictions in Brooklyn, and that the other six zones would remain intact. Still, she added that officials would “be looking around the state at the other zones” and evaluating capacity restrictions in the most infected areas, also suggesting the state would continue to argue the case at a lower court level.
Legal experts said that despite the governor’s assertion that the decision was limited to parishes and other houses of worship in Brooklyn, the court’s ruling could be used to challenge and overturn other restrictions elsewhere. “The decision is applicable to people in similar situations,” said Norman Siegel, a constitutional lawyer and former leader of the New York Civil Liberties Union. “It’s applicable to any synagogue, any church, to any mosque, to any religious setting.”
The decision represented something of a Thanksgiving gift for Catholics and Orthodox Jews, who had blasted Mr. Cuomo’s rules as a profound, and unfair, restriction on their First Amendment freedom of religion.
“I have said from the beginning the restrictions imposed by Governor Cuomo were an overreach that did not take into account the size of our churches or the safety protocols that have kept parishioners safe,” said Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of Brooklyn on Thursday morning, noting that Catholics had adhered to coronavirus safety protocols at Mass since the virus first emerged in New York in March. “Our churches have not been the cause of any outbreaks.”
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