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Supreme Court Denies Review in Casket Case, Monks' Victory Stands | National Review Online
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Supreme Court Denies Review in Casket Case,
Monks’ Victory Stands
By Vikrant P. Reddy
Octob er 15, 2 013 6:00 PM
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This morning, the U.S. Supreme Court decided against reviewing Saint Joseph
Abbey v. Castille. This means that the Fifth Circuit’s ruling in favor of the monks
of Saint Joseph Abbey — a significant victory against overcriminalization and
unnecessary licensing — will stand.
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For decades, the unlicensed sale of a funeral casket in Louisiana has been
punishable by heavy fines and up to 180 days in prison. In 2007, the Benedictine
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monks of Saint Joseph Abbey began manufacturing and selling cypress caskets to
support themselves. The caskets were sold for far less than they are at most other
funeral homes – sometimes at a quarter of the price. Although the monks perform
no other funeral services, they were enjoined from selling the caskets by the
Louisiana State Board of Embalmers and Funeral Directors.
As Megan McArdle observed, it is “hard to imagine any reason that the state needs
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10/17/13
Supreme Court Denies Review in Casket Case, Monks' Victory Stands | National Review Online
to get into regulating the procurement and sale of . . . wooden boxes.” It is
especially hard to imagine how a violation of the regulation could possibly justify
the heavy-handed sanction of incarceration.
Federal courts are extremely sympathetic to a state’s assessment of what is
necessary to ensure public health and safety, and they often find that as long as a
state can offer any “rational basis” for a regulation, it will be upheld. In this case,
the district court was unable to determine any rational basis whatsoever for
Louisiana’s protection of what Professor Jonathan Adler calls a “coffin cartel.”
In March, the Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court and noted that the deference
extended to a state’s defense of a regulation “does [not] require courts to accept
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nonsensical explanations.”
Louisiana sought Supreme Court review of the Fifth Circuit’s decision, but today’s
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denial of certiorari means the case is finally over. This is welcome news for the
monks, for their lawyers at the Institute for Justice, and for residents of the three
states under the Fifth Circuit’s jurisdiction: Louisiana, Texas, and Mississippi.
Other states, however, are not quite as fortunate. A circuit split exists on this
question because of the Tenth Circuit’s 2004 opinion in a similar case, Powers v.
Harris. The Tenth Circuit covers Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma,
Utah, and Wyoming. Until the split is resolved, other federal courts may decide
whether they are more persuaded by the logic of the Tenth Circuit or the Fifth
Circuit. (Note: In 2002, the Sixth Circuit, in Craigmiles v. Giles, adopted the
position that the Fifth Circuit has adopted.)
In the meantime, residents of the Tenth Circuit who do not want to see prison bars
should avoid selling wooden boxes.
— Vikrant P. Reddy is policy analyst for the Texas Public Policy Foundation and
the foundation’s Right On Crime initiative.
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