Calvary Chapel San Jose v. Cody

Background

Calvary Chapel San Jose, Southridge Baptist Church of San Jose California doing business as Southridge Church, Mike McClure, and Micaiah Irmler sued Santa Clara County officials in their official capacities. The defendants named in the opinion were Dr. Sara Cody, the County Public Health Officer, and County Supervisors Mike Wasserman, Cindy Chavez, Dave Cortese, Susan Ellenberg, and Joe Simitian.

The plaintiffs challenged a County stay-at-home order signed by Cody and effective June 5, 2020. They asserted claims under the First Amendment’s Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses, California’s constitutional religious-freedom provision, and California’s constitutional privacy provision. The privacy claim concerned the order’s requirement that gathering hosts record the names and contact information of people attending religious services for possible contact tracing.

The defendants moved to dismiss all claims. At the November 5, 2020 hearing, the plaintiffs said they planned to substantially revise their claims and add others in an amended complaint, and the defendants did not oppose allowing amendment.

Court’s reasoning

For the Free Exercise claims, the defendants relied on the standard from Jacobson v. Massachusetts, under which an emergency public-health measure is upheld unless it lacks a real or substantial relation to public health or is plainly and palpably an invasion of fundamental rights. The court said the plaintiffs had not pleaded facts showing either problem. The court also concluded that the plaintiffs had not alleged facts showing that the County Order lacked a secular purpose, primarily advanced or disapproved of religion, or created excessive government entanglement with religion under the Establishment Clause test discussed in Lemon v. Kurtzman.

The court dismissed the religious-freedom claims without prejudice. “Without prejudice” means the claims were not permanently barred by that dismissal and could be repleaded, subject to the court’s instructions.

For the privacy claim, the defendants argued that the plaintiffs lacked standing, meaning they had not adequately alleged an injury that gave them a right to bring the claim. The court agreed that the complaint did not adequately identify the privacy interest allegedly invaded by requiring a gathering host to collect attendee contact information. The court dismissed that claim without prejudice.

Disposition

The court granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss. It stated that claims against the County Supervisors were dismissed without leave to amend because the plaintiffs had not shown that they could plead facts connecting those officials to issuing or enforcing the public-health orders. The same passage said the dismissal was without prejudice to adding additional claims against the supervisors in an amended complaint. However, the conclusion stated that the claims against the County Supervisors were dismissed with prejudice, while the remaining claims were dismissed without prejudice. Those statements are inconsistent, and the opinion does not resolve the inconsistency.

All claims against Cody were dismissed with leave to amend. The remaining claims were dismissed without prejudice. The order was signed by United States District Judge Beth Labson Freeman.