The United States Justice Department filed court documents in support of a church in Mississippi that is suing local officials for permission to host drive-in services. The Temple Baptist Church in Greenville filed a lawsuit after police issued a $500 ticket to every person who attended the services in the parking lot of the church last week.
"The police started coming up, and we said, well, we think we're in our rights. And they started issuing tickets, $500 tickets, it may have been 50 — I mean 20 to 30 tickets. Everybody got one. It wasn't per car. Me and my wife was both in the car together, and both of us got tickets," Lee Gordon told WLBT.
The church argued that they were following social distancing guidelines and that Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves designated churches as an "essential business." They also claimed that it was discriminatory to allow drive-thru restaurants to remain open while barring the church from hosting drive-in services.
The Justice Department agreed, writing that "individual rights secured by the Constitution do not disappear during a public health crisis."
"Under strict scrutiny, the city has the burden to demonstrate that prohibiting the small church here from holding the drive-in services at issue here—services where attendees are required to remain in their cars in the church parking lot at all times with their windows rolled up and spaced consistent with CDC guidelines—is the least restrictive means of furthering a compelling interest. As of now, it seems unlikely that the city will be able to carry that burden," lawyers wrote in the 14-page document.
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