Last week's
Hobby Lobby decision would
almost be less awful if it
resulted in this:
Lawyers for two Guantanamo Bay detainees have filed motions asking a U.S. court to block officials from preventing the inmates from taking part in communal prayers during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. The lawyers argue that—in light of the Supreme Court’s recent Hobby Lobby decision—the detainees’ rights are protected under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA).
The motions were filed this week with the Washington D.C. district court on behalf of Emad Hassan of Yemen and Ahmed Rabbani of Pakistan. U.K.-based human rights group Reprieve said both men asked for the intervention after military officials at the prison "prevented them from praying communally during Ramadan."
"Hobby Lobby makes clear that all persons—human and corporate, citizen and foreigner, resident and alien—enjoy the special religious free exercise protections of the RFRA," the lawyers argued in court papers.
The men's lawyers argue that they are being punished for their hunger strike by not being allowed to participate in the communal prayers.
That would be a just and fitting outcome of the Roberts Five Hobby Lobby decision—free prayer for everybody, including Muslims.