22 States Back The Amish In School Vaccine Fight – But Will Supreme Court Hear Their Case?
We’ve been following the story of the Amish schools who faced fines reaching six figures for failing to adhere to New York’s vaccine requirement for school age children.
The children in question were Amish, and the schools in question were Amish-run schools. Previously, New York provided a religious exemption, but that ended in 2019.
The Amish in turn rejected the requirement to make sure their students were vaccinated. This led to three schools racking up fines that totaled $118,000.
Fast forward to this past March, when the three schools in question lost a federal court appeal. That left the Supreme Court as the remaining option for further appeal.
So the Amish decided to petition the Supreme Court to hear their case, asking them “to rule that the First Amendment supersedes a state law requiring that school children be vaccinated.”
Will the case be heard?
The Supreme Court hears about 80 cases each term. It must decide each year which of the many cases it will give its attention to.
As of the end of June, the court had already decided to hear 32 cases, before adjourning for summer break. It appears that as of now, no cases have been added since.
This is the time of year when they are making their final decisions on which cases to hear in the upcoming term. Decisions are apparently usually made at the latest by September, as the term begins in October.
They would need four justices to vote in favor of hearing the dispute for the case to move forward.
A “Quite Rare” Showing From State Attorneys General
Enter nearly two-dozen state attorneys general on the side of the Amish. A total of 22 of them, to be precise, have submitted briefs in support of the Amish position.
And having 22 state attorneys general is apparently a very big number for this sort of thing. From the report at publichealthpolicyjournal.com:
“The number of state attorneys general filing amicus briefs in support of our petition is tremendously significant,” Glaser said. “The typical case has zero amicus briefs from a state attorney general.”
Glaser said it’s notable if five state attorneys general file. More than 10 is “quite rare, and it guarantees the case is high-profile and of great national interest.”
Glaser is Greg Glaser, one of the attorneys representing the Amish side. It sounds like Alabama filed a brief which 20 other states signed on to, so to speak:
Alabama’s attorney general filed a brief on behalf of 21 states that addressed a “trend” of “growing hostility toward religious views” in states like New York:
“If it is ‘neutral and generally applicable’ for New York legislators to eliminate religious accommodations with such open disdain for the beliefs they protect, then it is not just New York’s Amish community under threat. …
“To be sure, States are generally free to try more stringent public-health regimes, but not by burdening only religiously motivated conduct, and especially not by interfering with the religious education and upbringing of children.”
Additionally, Florida’s AG filed a separate brief on behalf of the state:
In a separate brief, Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier said, “44 States and the District of Columbia have protected religious exemptions to compelled vaccination in schools. Their experience has shown that ensuring public health need not come at the cost of sacrificing religious freedom.”
Will this be enough to make a difference, as the Justices make their final decisions on what cases to take?
Attorney for the Amish: Religious Freedom on the Line
I speak as a lay person not a lawyer, but the fact that having more than 10 AGs filing on behalf of a petition is “quite rare” and also “guarantees” it to be a high profile case, I think has to count for something.
The Amish side has previously framed this as a matter of religious freedom, and along those same lines, Glaser also had this to say:
“This is not just a New York issue, nor is it limited to vaccines. It’s a national battle over the meaning of religious freedom.
“These attorneys general understand that if this ruling is left to stand, it gives a green light to state legislatures to target and dismantle religious freedom they find politically inconvenient.”
Given the time frame, it seems the Amish side will know something within a matter of weeks, if not days.
Smart Amish!
72 shots on the children’s vaccine schedule today and children have more problems than ever. 1 in 30 children have autism now, crib deaths are increasing, child diabetes, etc, etc, etc. Pregnant women and newborn babies are injected with HepB, RSV, etc., which are proven to be dangerous. It’s absolutely awful. All of the proof of these poisonous shots is well documented. Nobody in my entire family has had any shots in decades and we are healthier than the people around us who have. Kudos to the Amish!
They're not smart, they're just stubborn
Vaccines are an effective means of preventing life-threatening illnesses by boosting the body’s natural immune response to diseases caused by viruses and bacteria. Any so-called science saying otherwise is b.s. Sure, some people will have a reaction, and sometimes you might catch a different strain of whatever is going around, but science supports vaccination. Not the other way around. I had pneumonia way too many times as a kid and even had a collapsed lung during one bout. I got my pneumonia shot. I did have a trigeminal neuralgia reaction for a few days that subsided. But so far I have not had another bout of pneumonia. I used to admire the Amish for many reasons, but I’ve gotten quite disillusioned with some of their stands on many many issues. The Amish tend to vote Republican because they’re conservative, but I think they need to take a good look at what the Republican party has turned into. Sorry. I absolutely disagree with what you wrote. Try doing some actual research on ALL sites, not just so-called approved conspiracy ones.
Blind leading the blind
My dear, the conspiracy is not the one against the shots, but the one for it. It looks like you are the one who needs to ‘do your research,’ not the author (who is correct), or those who support him, like the Amish and myself among many others. The Amish are smart, and thus stubborn on this issue and rightfully so. The science supports the anti vax view, not the vax view if you truly do your research. The C-19 case is the biggest one ever, people are getting ill, infertile, and dropping like flies with ‘sudden death syndrome’ as a result. That is what the true science shows, not the misinformation sites. Aside from all these arguments for or against, none of that is the point. The actual point is that they have the right to refuse the vaccines. Period. And no one can argue with that.
I guess you're forgetting about polio
I guess we’re all forgetting about how deadly and devastating polio was , how about we also learn that god People brains minds to think
Vax logically refuted
Nobody should be forced to receive anything into their bodies that they do not want. To try to enforce that is tyranny. To those who have not yet done their homework, or their thinking…. no it is not for the ‘common good.’ Here is why:
Take the C vax or any typical flu shot. If someone tried to argue that ‘everyone’ needs to get it in order for ‘all’ to be safe, then it would not be effective. For instance, suppose you had your shot and I did not. If you told me you did not want me to visit you because I had not had mine, then you are saying that your shot was ineffective. Because if it was effective, the whole point was so that you would not have to worry about getting it from someone who had it. That would also include those who have not had the shot and may or may not have the ‘virus’ in question. So me getting a shot or not has absolutely zero to do with your health. If you want to get it, and feel ‘safe,’ then go right ahead. But it is by no means a community obligation or cooperative action. So I am by no means morally obligated to accept something into my body that I do not want in order for ‘you’ to be ‘safe.’ That is a contradiction in logic.
This argument also extends to all other vaccines that involve transmission, things like polio are another case. But that big vax push was a lie. It is neither ‘safe,’ nor ‘effective,’ unless the goal for effective was depopulation and safety was the afterlife in a good place.
Your logic is a bit bizarre, but okay, you’re opinion. There was way too much controversy over the Covid vaccine because it became a hot political debate with people saying it was created way too fast and not tested even though the research for the mRNA vaccines started way back in the 1960s. The Covid vaccine was built on that research. It didn’t just come out of the blue. And, oh yeah, it was Trump’s idea to develop the Covid vaccine calling it Operation Warp Speed. He was pretty proud of himself for it until he started getting backlash. I blame the media for creating confusion and a sense of doom in the early stages of the pandemic. And Trump wasn’t very clear on anything concerning the pandemic. The whole debate over whether vaccines are good for you or not, and now having RFK Jr. pulling the plug on accessibility, or trying to, goes against your statement of “if you want it, get it, but don’t tell me I have to.” If it’s not available, how can you opt to get a vaccine? If science is being suppressed, how can you discern the truth? The Amish may be against vaccines in general but they have to deal with a slew of rare genetic disorders due to inbreeding. So exactly how healthy are they? I read a book years ago where the author was on a quest to learn about simplicity and stayed with various Amish families. One ate very healthy homegrown homemade foods, but another family was heavily into prepackaged junk food and tons of sugar. The author was amazed at the extremely unhealthy diet this family followed, going against the generalization that all Amish eat healthy and are healthy. Just reading the description of the meals made my teeth hurt. Anyway, if you want to go along with the statement “you can get the vaccine but don’t tell me to” should go hand in hand with other things like if you want to pray, go ahead but don’t make me pray in school or say the pledge if it’s against my religion to do so. The problem with politics in general is one side is always trying to force the other side to do something it doesn’t want to do. At the moment, the conservatives are in power and they’re trying to force feed their beliefs on everyone else and they think they’re 100% right. A tangential health statement — my sister and her husband are very MAGA and they’ve been taking ivermectin regularly since Trump first touted it. After years of that, my brother-in-law has serious signs of Alzheimers. I dare not tell my sister that ivermectin side effects are exactly what he is exhibiting: confusion, dizziness, shaking hands, loss of coordination. But rather than get off of it, or go see a doctor, they swear by its efficacy. If it were me, I’d read up on the side effects of any supplement I was taking if I was exhibiting new scary symptoms of any sort and then get off of it to see if symptoms cleared up. Here’s a site on vaccines https://www.health.ny.gov/prevention/immunization/vaccine_safety/science.htm. And for a final thought in this rambling response – my husband has alpha gal from a lone star tick bite. He can’t even get a vaccine if he wanted to because there’s ingredients used in them that would set off a bad reaction. He can’t have anything that has any mammalian ingredients. As an example, he can’t have ketchup unless it’s certified organic and vegan because of the sugar. White sugar is processed through bone char. He has to be careful even taking certain things like Advil or vitamins. Gelatin, sugar, natural flavors, guar gum, xanthan gum, carrageenan … all bad. He has to carry an epipen. He would die if he ate french fries at a fast food place that were cooked in lard or beef tallow like RFK Jr. wants everyone to do. So I make herbal antiviral and antibacterial tinctures using vodka that has been certified as vegan and therefore safe for him to ingest. We rarely see a doctor. I’ll still argue that science supports vaccines and they should be available for anyone who wants them, and that school children are safer getting them than not.