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Sherbert v. Verner

Facts

Adele Sherbert was a member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. A central tenet of her faith required her to observe the Sabbath from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday and to refrain from working during that period.

Sherbert was employed at a textile mill in South Carolina. Her employer later changed its work schedule and began requiring employees to work on Saturdays. Sherbert informed her employer that she could not work on Saturdays due to her religious beliefs.

Because Sherbert refused Saturday work for religious reasons, she was terminated. After losing her job, she sought unemployment compensation benefits from the state.

South Carolina denied Sherbert’s application for benefits. The state determined that she was ineligible because she had refused “suitable work” and failed, without good cause, to accept employment available to her. In substance, South Carolina treated her refusal to work on Saturday as disqualifying misconduct for unemployment compensation purposes.

Sherbert challenged the denial under the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. She argued that conditioning unemployment benefits on abandoning religious practice imposed an unconstitutional burden on her free exercise of religion.

The case required the Supreme Court to determine whether a state violates the Free Exercise Clause when it denies government benefits to an individual because she refuses work that conflicts with sincere religious obligations.

Issues

Does a state violate the Free Exercise Clause by denying unemployment benefits to a person who refuses to work on her Sabbath due to sincere religious beliefs?

Rule

When the government substantially burdens religious exercise—such as by conditioning an important public benefit on abandoning religious practice—the government must satisfy strict scrutiny.

The state must show:

  1. a compelling governmental interest, and

  2. that the denial is the least restrictive means of achieving that interest.

Application

The Court found that South Carolina’s denial imposed a substantial burden on Sherbert’s religious exercise. Sherbert faced a coercive choice: either violate her religious obligation by working on Saturday or lose unemployment benefits needed for economic survival. This “pressure” was treated as a form of indirect compulsion inconsistent with the Free Exercise Clause.

The Court rejected the argument that this was merely the incidental effect of a neutral benefits rule. In administering unemployment benefits, the state necessarily makes individualized determinations about eligibility (such as whether a claimant refused work without good cause). Because the system allowed discretion and case-by-case evaluation, denying Sherbert’s claim on religious grounds required heightened justification.

The state’s asserted interests were not compelling in the way constitutional doctrine requires. South Carolina claimed it needed to prevent fraudulent or opportunistic claims and preserve the integrity of the unemployment compensation system. The Court acknowledged those interests generally, but found they were too generalized and unsupported by evidence in this application.

Moreover, the Court emphasized tailoring. Even if the state had legitimate administrative concerns, denying benefits to sincere religious claimants was not the least restrictive means. The state could assess sincerity and adjudicate claims without adopting a blanket rule that effectively penalized religious observance.

Because the state failed strict scrutiny, the denial was unconstitutional. This formed what became known as the Sherbert Test, a strict scrutiny framework for Free Exercise burdens.

In future cases, Sherbert becomes crucial in distinguishing benefit regimes involving individualized exemptions from general criminal laws. It also becomes the key baseline that Smith later narrows: after Smith, strict scrutiny generally does not apply to neutral, generally applicable laws—but Sherbert remains important in individualized exemption contexts and in understanding the pre-Smith approach.

Holding

The Court held that South Carolina’s denial of unemployment benefits violated Sherbert’s Free Exercise rights. The state failed to demonstrate a compelling interest sufficient to justify burdening religious practice, and the denial was unconstitutional.

Court

The case was decided by the United States Supreme Court. Sherbert appealed the denial of unemployment benefits through the state system, and the Supreme Court reversed, applying strict scrutiny to the state’s burden on religious exercise.

Exam Notes

  1. Landmark Free Exercise case establishing strict scrutiny (“Sherbert Test”)

  2. Denial of benefits created substantial burden: forced choice between religion and benefits

  3. Applies strongly in unemployment/benefit contexts with individualized determinations

  4. State must show compelling interest + least restrictive means

  5. Often tested with Sabbath-work and unemployment benefit hypotheticals

  6. Major doctrinal contrast with Employment Division v. Smith

  7. Foundation for RFRA’s strict scrutiny framework

  8. Key concept: government cannot condition benefits on violating religious beliefs

  9. Use in exam IRAC: identify burden → apply strict scrutiny → assess state interest/tailoring

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