News Release
For Immediate Release: 9.1.26
Contact: Peyton Drew, media@firstliberty.org
Direct: 972-941-4453
Minnesota County Jails and Fines Amish for Building Homes and Businesses in Accordance with Their Faith
County uses building permit process to pressure Amish community to compromise their beliefs.
Milaca, MN–First Liberty Institute, Foley & Lardner LLP, and the Harvard Law School Religious Freedom Clinic sent a demand letter to Mille Lacs County, Minnesota on behalf of two Amish congregations that are being discriminated against by the county through draconian zoning and permit schemes, making it virtually impossible for the Amish to live according to their sincerely held religious beliefs.
You can read the demand letter here.
“The County is clearly discriminating against the Amish, refusing to provide means of religious accommodation,” stated First Liberty’s Senior Counsel Ryan Gardner. “The Amish merely want to provide for their families by building their homes and businesses in accordance with their faith, but the County is making that simple goal virtually impossible – consequently pressuring them to go against their conscience of sincerely held religious beliefs or face civil or criminal charges.”
“The Amish in Mille Lacs County simply want to continue living out their faith peacefully – just like they have for generations across the country,” said Josh McDaniel, the Director of the Harvard Law School Religious Freedom Clinic. “Draconian enforcement without any consideration of a simple, religious accommodation is wrong. The Amish should not have to fear criminal convictions or jail time for merely abiding by their sincerely held religious beliefs.”
In 2022, the County moved its building code application process completely online and refused to make any accommodations for the Amish for several months. Even after relenting and reinstating paper copies, the County began charging a $50 fee for all paper applications, which are used almost exclusively by the Amish. Beyond creating difficulties for them to participate in the building permit process, the County is also refusing to issue permits to the Amish unless they compromise their religious beliefs to satisfy modern requirements in the County’s building code.
In the face of this discrimination, many in the Amish community proceeded to build their homes and businesses and have faced civil and criminal charges as a result, with one member even being convicted and jailed for simply building and living in his home. Significantly, the ordinance used to prosecute the Amish allows the County to exempt structures at its discretion. Thus, the County could exempt the Amish, but has refused to do so, opting instead to aggressively prosecute the Amish community.
The demand letter states, “The Amish community has consistently sought practical means of complying with County requirements while remaining faithful to its religious convictions. Rather than pursue those alternatives, the County appears to have responded with escalating citations, criminal prosecutions, fines, and warrants. That course is impossible to reconcile with [federal law’s] directive that governments employ the least restrictive means available before substantially burdening religious exercise.”
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About First Liberty Institute
First Liberty Institute is the largest legal organization in the nation dedicated exclusively to defending religious freedom for all Americans.
To arrange an interview, contact Peyton Drew at media@firstliberty.org.
