The question that the Supreme Court is trying
to answer in Tanzin versus Tanvir is whether
the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993
permits suits seeking money damages against
individuals federal employees.
The parties in this case are three immigrants
who were practicing Muslims and the FBI agents
who placed them on the No Fly List.
The FBI agents asked these men to become
confidential informants against other Muslims,
but the men refused, saying that doing so would violate
their religious beliefs.
These men claimed that they were placed on the No Fly List
in retaliation for their refusal.
Though, the FBI eventually removed these men from
the No fly List, Muhammad Tanvir
and the others are suing for money damages under
the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993,
which is sometimes called RFRA.
RFRA enacts a very searching balancing test
called strict scrutiny,
which says that in order for a government action
to succeed when it substantially burdens someone's
free exercise of religion,
that government action both has to serve a compelling
government interest and also must be done in a way that is
the least restrictive means of furthering that interest.
The text of RFRA says that it allows for
"all appropriate relief."
So that's the real question,
that's why this is a case.
If the very text of RFRA said "money damages,"
I think this case would have been resolved a long time ago.
The reason this is a Supreme Court case is
that there's some ambiguity, RFRA says appropriate relief,
but it doesn't say what the appropriate relief is.
It's a significant question because while most cases under
the Religious Freedom Restoration Act want the government to
just stop illegal activity,
there is a small number of RFRA cases where the plaintiffs
do seek additional compensatory or even punitive damages
because that's the only realistic remedy they have.
Tanvir, for example, was a long haul trucker,
and he was unable to keep his job because he could not fly
back from driving one-way loads.
Tanzin frames their argument around the text, history,
and precedent of RFRA to determine
what appropriate relief means.
It's definitely the case that RFRA does not explicitly
grant money damages to be recovered
against a government actor.
Also, the courts have said in recent years that
in the absence of an explicit grant of money damages
in federal law,
the court should not read money damages into
federal statutes unnecessarily.
Tanvir makes two arguments. The first is the decision
in Franklin versus Gwinnett County,
which was decided unanimously by Supreme Court
the year before RFRA was enacted.
The Supreme Court in Franklin found that
when civil rights statutes are ambiguous
about whether money damages can be recovered
against the government,
the money damages do fall under the definition
of appropriate relief.
Tanvir's second argument is that under Section 1983
of the Civil Rights Act,
which is the principal enforcement mechanism against
officials who violate civil rights or constitutional rights,
money damages against officials who violate
the law have always applied.
Tanzin versus Tanvir will have a big impact
on future religious liberty cases.
But it also gets at the issue of how do you resolve
certain textual ambiguities.
And I think that cuts across not just RFRA cases,
but a wide variety of state and federal Laws.