Wisconsin is weighing the possibility of ending the religious tax exemption rather than granting an exemption to a Catholic organization.
Earlier this year, the Supreme Court ruled 9-0 that Wisconsin imposed a “denominational preference by differentiating between religions based on theological lines,” as explained by Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
According to the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, Wisconsin officials are attempting to avoid the ruling by “attacking the religious exemption itself,” the legal group explained. “The attorney general recently asked the state’s high court to consider axing the exemption entirely—undermining a key religious exemption relied on by faith-based organizations across Wisconsin.”
Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul filed a brief before the state’s supreme court, claiming the U.S. Supreme Court “did not prescribe a particular remedy.”
“Discrimination is cured by restoring equal treatment, which can be accomplished here in one of two ways: either by expanding the statutory exemption to groups like Catholic Charities or else by eliminating it altogether,” Kaul wrote, adding, “By striking the exemption, this Court can avoid collateral damage to Wisconsin workers while still curing the discrimination the U.S. Supreme Court identified. It should so hold, thereby bringing this long-running case to a close.”
The Becket Fund argued in a filing that the issue should have been addressed “well before reversal and remand by the United States Supreme Court. It should have made those arguments in a timely fashion so that this Court and the United States Supreme Court had an opportunity to evaluate them.”
The case, Catholic Charities Bureau, Inc. v. Wisconsin Labor Review Commission et al., centered on whether Catholic Charities should be exempt from paying into the state’s unemployment insurance program due to its religious nature.”
