A federal judge on Saturday handed North Carolina churches a victory by allowing them to meet indoors despite an order from the state’s governor limiting such gatherings to 10 people.
The order by North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, required worship services of 10 or more people to be conducted outdoors unless it was decided it was “impossible” to do so. If law enforcement determined the church was wrong to meet indoors, the leaders of the congregation could be served with a misdemeanor.
A pair of churches and a Christian organization, Return America, filed suit against Cooper.
U.S. District Judge James C. Dever III, in his Saturday decision, issued a statewide injunction against Cooper’s order, saying the plaintiffs had demonstrated a likelihood to win the case.
“There is no pandemic exception to the Constitution of the United States or the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment,” wrote Dever, who was nominated by President George W. Bush.
The churches, Dever wrote, “have pledged to practice social distancing and other public health guidelines.”
Dever criticized Cooper’s order for exempting businesses and companies but not carving out an exception for churches. Restrictions “inexplicably applied to one group and exempted from another do little to further” the goal of stopping the spread of COVID-19 “and do much to burden religious…
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