Today is the 25th anniversary of Justice Anton Scalia’s opinion in Employment Division v. Smith, which Michael Stokes Paulsen describes as Justice Scalia’s Worst Opinion: Smith is not by a long shot the worst Supreme Court decision of all time, or even of the past twenty-five years. As a matter of the human harm it inflicts, there are far more egregious cases.Planned Parenthood v. CaseyandRoe v. Wade, the Court’s abortion decisions,top the listin the modern era. Nor isSmith the most indefensible of opinions in terms of the Court’s legal analysis.Roe,Casey,Lawrence v. Texas, andWindsor v. United States, each adopting and extending some form of “substantive due process,” are worse thanSmithon this score.Smithis … Continue reading Justice Scalia’s Worst Opinion