By COLlive staff
Judge Amy Barrett, nominated by US President Donald Trump last month to fill the vacant seat in the Supreme Court created by the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, will be a defender of religious liberty for all, wrote attorney Nathan Lewin in an Op-Ed for the JTA.
“President Trump seeks to replace Jewish Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg with a devout Catholic from Indiana. Some might worry that this would diminish the Court’s understanding or compassion for Jews in America. They may wonder whether the new Justice has ever met or had any contact with Jews. But having worked with Judge Amy Coney Barrett, I have seen her defend the rights of Jewish Americans firsthand,” Lewin wrote.
“Amy Barrett worked with me in 1999 and 2000 on behalf of Hasidic clients. I had — and continue to have — an ongoing battle with authorities in cities, towns and villages across the country that attempt to hinder or prevent the display of Hanukkah menorahs on public property by Chabad followers of the Lubavitcher Rebbe. (No one contests the right to display menorahs on private property, and no Jewish group other than Chabad-Lubavitch, to my knowledge, has tried to erect and display large menorahs on central public locations.)
“The Supreme Court had ruled in 1989, in a case that I argued, that such a display in front of Pittsburgh’s City Hall was constitutional, and we then won full-court en banc victories in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and in Atlanta, Georgia,” Lewin wrote.
Read the full Op-Ed here.
