North Dakota Rejects Religious Freedom Amendment

Voters in North Dakota yesterday rejected a proposed amendment to the state constitution which would have increased the burden on civil authorities attempting to limit religion-based conscientious objection to state laws:

North Dakota voters rejected Measure 3, which its proponents said was necessary in strengthening protections for those who choose to exercise their deeply-held religious beliefs.

With 70 percent of precincts reporting, voters said no to Measure 3 by a 64.5 percent to 35.4 percent margin. The Associated Press called the Measure 3 race at approximately 10:15 p.m. [ . . . ]

The language of Measure 3 stated that a person has the right to act or to refuse to act in a manner due to a deeply-held religious belief. It would then be up to the government to prove that it has a compelling government interest in infringing on one’s right to act or not act. The measure’s proponents said that it was needed in order to strengthen people’s religious liberty.

That’s a thick margin, which compounds the surprise of the verdict, given North Dakota’s reputation as both socially conservative in outlook and highly religious in practice. Though it’s not clear whether this amendment went down because of its principles or its specifics: Howard Friedman at the Religion Clause blog suggests it may have failed because “opponents of the measure argued that the amendment was vaguely worded, unnecessary, and might allow freedom of religion to be used as a defense in criminal cases.”

In other words, voters objected to this particular amendment, not the concept generally. Over at Mirror of Justice, though, Thomas Berg sounds a bit more worried : “a possible lesson here for religious-liberty advocates (applicable in other contexts too) is to beware of pushing the envelope too much.”