Attorneys with Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe and Alliance Defending Freedom filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court urging it to hear the case of a devout Orthodox Jew suing the city of University Heights, Ohio.
In January 2021, Daniel Grand e-mailed a dozen friends to invite them to his home to pray as a minyan, a “threshold requirement for the most sacred acts of Jewish communal worship,” that upcoming Sabbath. But when city officials found out about the e-mail, and before any minyan convened, the city demanded that Grand “immediately cease and desist any and all” uses of his home as a “place of religious assembly” unless he first obtained a special use permit, which the city requires for houses of worship in residential districts.
The brief explains that city officials targeted Grand simply because of his religious practice, and that he was never trying to establish his private residence as a synagogue; he was simply hosting a prayer gathering with friends. Further, city officials ordered police to spy on Grand’s home and encouraged his neighbors to file complaints if anyone visited. The city then issued unfounded property violations, unlawfully withheld his certificate of occupancy and tax abatements—which cost him thousands of dollars in additional taxes—regularly failed to collect his trash, and engaged in a broader pattern of harassment that went far beyond ordinary zoning enforcement.
“Every American has the right to host a prayer gathering in his home, and he certainly doesn’t need a city permit to do so. When government officials forbid that, courts must hold those individuals accountable,” said ADF Senior Counsel and Vice President of Appellate Advocacy John Bursch. “The city’s actions underscore a troubling trend of weaponizing zoning laws against people of faith while allowing other gatherings of the same size, like book clubs or poker nights, to meet without issue. This is religious discrimination that the First Amendment prohibits.”
The reply brief filed in Grand v. City of University Heights explains how Grand canceled his planned minyan as ordered and tried to comply with the city’s directive by submitting a permit application. The burdens compounded, however. Neighbors opposed the permit with letters protesting, “I am not Jewish, and I do not want our neighborhood labeled as Jewish.” The city then broadcast a public hearing marked by overt hostility to Jewish religious practice.
As the hearing ended, commission members asked Grand to submit more materials for discussion at a second public hearing. Grand withdrew his permit application because he did not want to submit to a second (and inevitably hostile) public spectacle, and because he realized that the permit would require him to convert his home into a house of worship, and then he could no longer live there.
“So, paradoxically, the only way for Grand to pray with friends at his home was to convert his home to a commercial space and move his family,” the brief notes.
Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe and ADF attorneys asked the high court to review Grand’s religious discrimination case after a district court dismissed it, and an appellate court upheld the dismissal.
Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) is the world’s largest legal organization committed to protecting religious freedom, free speech, the sanctity of life, marriage and family, and parental rights.
Editor’s Note: A Spiritual Battle
Robert Gottselig, an Executive Director for the Friends of Israel Gospel Ministry, in his article, “Antisemitism Is Once Again Spreading Like A Wildfire—and The Reason Rests In A Spiritual Battle,” wrote:
