A lawsuit filed in Connecticut Superior Court is challenging the state’s removal of the religious exemption from mandatory school vaccinations, which families say is not only absurd but also unconstitutional.
The lawsuit involves two families, with each of them having one child currently in school under previously granted vaccine exemptions and a younger child unable to register for school at all due to the new state law, which will take effect on Sept. 1 at the beginning of the 2022-2023 school year.
The families are seeking a court order that would allow the younger children to attend school with religious vaccine exemptions just like their older siblings, said Kevin Barry, an attorney representing the families.
“It’s arbitrary,” Barry told The Epoch Times. “Those children share the same home. They eat at the same dinner table. They play together all the time. But one of them is allowed in school and one of them is not.”
While the law doesn’t force children to get vaccinated, it prohibits unvaccinated children who do not qualify for a medical exemption from enrolling in school.
Connecticut is among the 21 states that have adopted a Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which essentially states that the government must demonstrate a “compelling interest” to infringe the free exercise of one’s religion, and that it must use the “least restrictive” means to advance that interest.
Barry argued that the law erasing religious exemptions won’t pass the RFRA test, since religious exemptions and school vaccine mandates have co-existed in Connecticut for 60 years without causing any major outbreaks of childhood diseases, such as measles and whooping cough.
In other words, there is no compelling state interest in blocking children of religious families from attending school, which is far from being the least restrictive approach to a public health concern.
“We want to have a trial for this,” he said. “We will see if the state law is necessary. We can examine the data from Connecticut Department of Public Health to see if there was [a compelling interest]. We can see if there was a problem that needed to be fixed.”
On top of that, Barry argued that the 2021 law violates Connecticut’s own constitution, which, like those of many other states, guarantees the right to an education.
“The governor should have vetoed this bill,” the attorney said. “When the legislature does something that violates the constitution, it’s the governor’s job to veto it.”
In fact, Lamont has publicly acknowledged the state’s obligation to educate all children, regardless of their vaccination status.
“If the governor doesn’t do it, then the citizens have to go to the courts,” Barry said. “That’s where we are.”
Connecticut and Mississippi are so far the only RFRA states that don’t offer religious exemptions from school vaccine mandates.
