by Jorge Gomez • 3 minutes
On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear our case on behalf of Fire Chief Ron Hittle. After more than 20 years of service, he was fired by the City of Stockton, California because he attended a leadership conference that took place at a church.
The Court’s decision is disappointing. But the Court didn’t simply deny the case outright. It actually did something which offers hope for future cases involving religious discrimination in the workplace.
Two justices attached a rare dissent arguing that the Court should have taken Chief Hittle’s case. Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch wrote that this was an opportunity to revisit a confusing legal doctrine that’s been in place for over 50 years. They noted that the framework created in the 1973 case McDonnell Douglas Corp. v Green has caused “chaos” for lower courts evaluating employment discrimination cases.
“This case highlights how McDonnell Douglas may distort a lower court’s analysis,” Thomas and Gorsuch wrote. “Hittle presented ‘ample’ evidence of discriminatory intent on the part of those who decided to terminate him…Yet, after applying McDonnell Douglas, the District Court and the Ninth Circuit ruled for the city.”
Attaching a dissent to a denial is incredibly rare. The Supreme Court receives about 7,000 to 8,000 requests each year. It typically agrees to hear only about 60 or 70 cases, less than one percent of all requests. Nearly all appeals are denied outright, without any comment or explanation.
The fact that two justices made a point to write a dissent is highly significant. Dissenting opinions like this one are often the first step toward getting a harmful precedent overturned.
First Liberty Senior Counsel Stephanie Taub explains why there’s a silver lining in this response from the Court:
Sometimes, it takes a few cases and attempts to lay the groundwork before the Supreme Court decides to take up an important issue. Our Coach Kennedy and Faithful Carrier cases are great examples.
In Coach Kennedy’s case, the Court declined to hear his first appeal, which was at an early stage of the litigation. There, four justices attached a rare statement explaining the legal issues that needed clarification before the Court could hear the case. The case worked its way back through the federal courts. In 2022, we argued the case at the Supreme Court and won a landmark victory that restored religious freedom for millions of Americans.
In our Faithful Carrier case involving postal worker Gerald Groff, the Court also declined to take up at least three cases that had asked to reevaluate the workplace religious accommodation standard before it decided to take up Groff v. DeJoy. In 2023, we achieved a unanimous 9-0 victory that strengthened legal protections for religious employees nationwide.
Ideally, we would have wanted an opportunity to argue Fire Chief Hittle’s case before the Court. But this does not mean that the battle for religious employees is over. Far from it.
We now have a powerful dissent in our hands that we can use as we continue to fight for all people of faith whose religious liberty is threatened.
Please continue to pray for Chief Hittle.
Today marks the end of a lengthy legal battle. Ron fought valiantly to protect religious liberty rights so that fewer people would experience religious discrimination at work. We honor him for his perseverance and willingness to take a stand for faith.
Click below if you would like to express your support and say thank you to Fire Chief Hittle:
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