AJC Calls For Enactment Of Legislation To Protect Religious Liberty In The Workplace

American Jewish Committee
Thursday, 31 July 1997

The following statement was issued by Richard T. Foltin, Legislative Director and Counsel in the Office of Government and International Affairs of the American Jewish Committee, today applauding the planned introduction of the Workplace Religious Freedom Act of 1997 by Senators Dan Coats and John Kerry:

"The American Jewish Committee enthusiastically endorses the Workplace Religious Freedom Act introduced in the Senate today by Senators Dan Coats and John Kerry. We applaud their leadership in the battle to safeguard religious liberty and protect against discrimination in the workplace on the basis of religion. We look forward to working with them on this important initiative.

"The Workplace Religious Freedom Act is intended to assure that employers have a meaningful obligation to reasonably accommodate their employees' religious practices. Passage of the Act would be a milestone in the protection of religious liberty. We strongly urge that the U.S. Congress act promptly to enact it into law.

"For many religiously observant Americans, the greatest peril to their ability to carry out their religious faiths, on a day-to-day basis, may come from employers. Employers who will not make reasonable accommodation for observance of the Sabbath and other holy days. Employers who refuse to make a reasonable accommodation to employees who must wear religiously-required garb, such as a yarmulke, a turban or clothing that meets modesty requirements.

"In 1972, the U.S. Congress amended the Civil Rights Act of 1964 so as to require that employers reasonably accommodate an employee's religious practice or observance unless to do so would impose an undue hardship on the employer. This standard, although appropriate on its face, has been interpreted by the courts so narrowly as to place little restraint on an employer's ability to refuse to provide religious accommodation. The Workplace Religious Freedom Act will restore to the religious accommodation provision the weight that Congress originally intended.

"The restoration of this protection is no small matter. The refusal of an employer, absent undue hardship, to provide reasonable accommodation of a religious practice should be seen as -- and was intended by Congress in 1972 to be treated as -- a form of religious discrimination. And religious discrimination should be treated fully as seriously as any other form of discrimination that stands between Americans and equal employment opportunities.

"Enactment of the Workplace Religious Freedom Act will constitute an important step towards ensuring that all members of society, whatever their religious beliefs and practices, will be protected from an invidious form of discrimination."

Mr. Foltin chairs the Coalition for Religious Freedom in the Workplace, a coalition of religious and civil liberties groups that has come together to urge passage of legislation to strengthen the law on religious accommodation. Besides AJC, its members include, among others, Agudath Israel of America, the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, the Baptist Joint Committee, the National Association of Evangelicals, the Christian Legal Society, People for the American Way Action Fund, Traditional Values Coalition, the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, the North American Council for Muslim Women, and Guru Gobind Singh Foundation, an organization representing Sikh Americans.

For more information, or to contact American Jewish Committee, see their website at: www.ajc.org