F. F., as Parent of Y. F., et al. v. New York, et al.

In June 2019, New York State repealed the longstanding religious exemption to its school vaccination requirement, leaving in place a medical exemption. The vaccination scheme does not require students over 18, or any other adult in the school environment, to be vaccinated. In supporting the repeal, various legislators, including leadership and the law’s sponsors, made religiously hostile comments, rejecting the notion of a true religious objection to vaccination and belittling such objectors as “anti-vaxxers” and misguided fools. As a result of the repeal, thousands of children who were previously exempted from the vaccine requirement based on their religions objections have been evicted from all public, private and religious schools and put in the position of choosing between their religious beliefs and access to school-based education. Does New York’s religious exemption repeal violate the First Amendment’s Free Exercise clause because (1) either (a) it allows for secular exemptions and, thus, is not generally applicable, or (b) its enactment was motivated by religious bias and, thus, it is not neutral; and (2) it is both under- and over-inclusive and, thus, not narrowly tailored to achieve a compelling governmental interest?