The Seventh Circuit upheld the dismissal of three Illinois school employees’ lawsuits challenging their districts’ COVID-19 “vaccinate or test” policy under Title VII and the Emergency Use Authorization Act (“EUA”). The case, Bowlin v. Board of Directors, Judah Christian School, et. al., involved employees at two central Illinois public school districts and a private school. The court found the plaintiffs failed to identify any religious belief that conflicted with weekly testing and instead relied only on personal or moral objections, which are not protected under Title VII. The court also emphasized that employers are not required to grant accommodations that would force them to violate state law, and exempting the employees from both vaccination and testing would have required schools to disregard Governor Pritzker’s binding COVID-19 Executive Order.
Illinois’ COVID-19 Order required all school personnel either to be vaccinated or to undergo weekly COVID-19 testing, with a religious exemption available only from vaccination, not from testing. After the Illinois State Board of Education and Department of Public Health issued guidance instructing schools to implement the Order, the plaintiffs sought religious exemptions from vaccination but also refused the required weekly testing, asserting that testing violated their “moral conscience.” Their districts placed them on unpaid leave or terminated them for noncompliance. Similar to the case Lenz v. Advocate Health and Hospitals Corp, we previously reported on, in reviewing their claims, the court explained that Title VII requires employees to identify a sincerely held religious belief that conflicts with a job requirement, and the plaintiffs never tied their objection to testing to any religious doctrine or practice. Title VII prohibits employers from discharging or otherwise discriminating against any individual with respect to the terms and conditions of his/her employment because of the individual’s religion.
The court held that the plaintiffs failed to state a Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 religious accommodation claim because they never identified a religious belief that conflicted with weekly testing, and their objections, rooted only in “moral conscience” and personal views about medical necessity, were not religious in nature. The court also noted that employers are not required to offer accommodations that would force them to break the law. The court also upheld dismissal of the EUA claim (no private right of action) and found the plaintiffs’ Illinois Public Health Code argument waived.
This case reinforces the fact that public employers cannot disregard a binding state executive order, even when employees request religious accommodation. The Seventh Circuit made clear that Title VII does not require schools to offer accommodation that would force them to violate Illinois law, and it clarified that personal or moral objections are not enough to trigger religious accommodation protections.
As we have discussed in prior issues, religious accommodation claims continue to proliferate in schools regarding both parents and staff. Contact any of our student or personnel practice group attorneys with your questions.
