Docket Report: Landor v. Louisiana Department of Corrections and Public Safety

Landor is a Rastafarian who grew his hair out as part of his religious practice. While serving a short term in Louisiana state prison, officials shaved his head, even though he showed them an earlier Fifth Circuit decision holding that cutting Rastafarians’ hair was a violation of federal law. He was released only weeks later, and he is now suing the prison officials in their private capacities for damages under the relevant federal law, the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA). The RLUIPA is the result of a long and interesting interaction between the Court and Congress. In a nutshell, the Court first said that the First Amendment right to free exercise does not carve out exemptions to neutral, generally applicable laws in Employment Division v. Smith, a 1990 case involving the religious use of peyote, a hallucinogenic drug. Congress responded by passing the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which statutorily resurrected strict scrutiny of government actions that “substantially burden” religious exercise. This means that such actions would need to further a compelling a government interest and they must be the least restrictive means of satisfying that interest. In initial form, RFRA applied to all levels of government. The Court responded in City of Boerne v. Flores, a 1997 decision, that Congress had exceeded its authority under the Fourteenth Amendment’s enforcement powers, leaving a more limited RFRA that applied only to the federal government. RLUIPA was Congress’s next move: it used the constitution’s spending power to, in effect, apply RFRA against the states in more limited domains—as relevant here, with respect to institutionalized persons. Neither RFRA nor RLUIPA explicitly allow lawsuits against officials in their individual capacities for money damages. They say, instead, that a person claiming a violation of the act may obtain “appropriate relief” against the “government,” and defines the term government to include “official[s].” Landor’s main opening comes from a 2020 Supreme Court decision, Tanzin v. Tanvir, which held that RFRA permits suits against federal officials in their individual capacities for money damages. He points to the identical language in RFRA and RLUIPA and the history of the act. If he were in federal prison, the suit would be permitted under that precedent. Given the mirrored statutes, why a different result if in state prison? The answer, according to Louisianna, goes back to that long conversation between the Court and Congress. RLUIPA is built on a different foundation than RFRA. Because RLUIPA is based on Congress’s authority under the spending clause, there is a quasi-contract aspect to the Act—the state receives money, in exchange for complying with some requirements. But it must be clear what is being exchanged for the money. And “appropriate relief” does not put the state, let alone individual officers, on notice that they may be liable for money damages in their individual capacities. Whereas Landor cozies up to Tanzin, Louisiana sidles up to Sossamon v. Texas, a 2011 case that held that by accepting federal funds states do not consent to suits for money damages under RLUIPA (though they did not decide then whether individual-capacity liability exists under the Act). The Fifth Circuit felt bound by Sossamon, and held that RLUIPA does not permit suits for money damages in this kind of case. Landor appealed to the Supreme Court. The bot predicts that the Court will affirm, so Landor is out of luck. A fair amount of uncertainty on votes, but the vote is predicted to basically be along ideological lines, with the three liberals dissenting.