The California supreme court justice Leondra Kruger is widely considered to be a possible successor to Stephen Breyer, who recently announced his imminent retirement from the U.S. Supreme Court. Around a decade ago, Ed Whelan notes, Kruger forcefully argued against the idea of a “ministerial exception” to employment-discrimination laws:
As an assistant to the solicitor general, Kruger argued on behalf of the Obama administration in Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. EEOC. The brief that she and other Obama administration lawyers submitted took a surprisingly aggressive stance against the very existence of a general “ministerial exception” to employment-discrimination laws. According to her position, religious organizations are limited to the right to freedom of association that labor unions and social clubs enjoy.
Kruger maintained that position at oral argument, to the amazement of even Justice Kagan. . . . The Obama administration’s position, [Chief Justice Roberts explained], “is hard to square with the text of the First Amendment itself, which gives special solicitude to the rights of religious organizations. We cannot accept the remarkable view that the Religion Clauses have nothing to say about a religious organization’s freedom to select its own ministers.”
To be sure, Kruger might contend that she was simply representing the position of her client. But it would be entirely proper for the White House and, if she is nominated, for senators to probe whether she in fact helped form the government’s “amazing,” [in Kagan’s words], position against religious liberty.
Read more on National Review: https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/supreme-court-contender-leondra-kruger-versus-religious-liberty/