Please contact your US Representative now andask him or her to co-sponsor of the GRACE Act, and support the free exercise of religion in all 50 states!

Four states have made religious exemptions to vaccination illegal and similar actions are being discussed in state legislatures around the country. While public health policy is constitutionally given to the states, any state public health law must be in line with the First Amendment of the United States Constitution and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, which provide the right to free exercise of religion.

The GRACE Act (Guaranteeing Religious Accommodation in Childhood Education Act), introduced by Congressman Greg Steube (R-FL), seeks to restore the alignment between the First Amendment and state public health law. By cutting federal education funds to states that deny citizens the right to a religious vaccine exemption, states planning such actions will need to choose between honoring religious liberty or being denied federal funding. This bill compels states to choose between federal funds and continuing official religious discrimination, and ensures that states planning to deny it in the future will think twice before doing so.

TAKE ACTION

Please use the panel to the right to send a message to your member of the House of Representatives urging him or her to co-sponsor and support the GRACE Act.

Please call your representative's office and urge him or her to co-sponsor and support the GRACE Act.

You can look up your representative here:

https://www.house.gov/

ISSUES

While there are currently only four states that completely forbid religious exemptions, this accounts for 20% of all American children; over 14 million children and their families are being denied the right to practice their sincerely held religious beliefs. We must end this persecution. All four of these states had religious exemptions prior to 2015 and serious efforts to repeal religious exemptions have been made in recent years in Hawaii, Oregon, Vermont and New Jersey with an intense battle over the issue ongoing in Massachusetts. 

The GRACE Act will not require any state to have a religious exemption, but it will cut discretionary federal funding to any state that denies its citizens the right to a religious exemption to vaccination. 

This is not only an issue of religious freedom, but also of parental rights and the right to an education. Parents have the right to decide how to raise their children, which was emphasized in the recent Supreme Court decision, Mahmoud v. Taylor. Children shouldn’t be denied access to an education over their parents’ sincerely held religious beliefs.

This discrimination is occurring in public, private and faith-based schools. It is also denying children the right to access extracurricular activities, special education services and summer camps. Religious freedom is not just for adults; it must also protect the most sacred and cherished members of our families – our children.

The GRACE Act will not require any state to have a religious exemption, but it will cut federal education funding to any state that denies its citizens the right to a religious exemption to vaccination.

Why is the GRACE Act Needed?

• States do not have the right to trample on religious liberty which is enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.
• Until 2015, 48 states allowed religious exemptions.
• Since 2015 4 states have repealed their religious exemptions.
• The argument that religious exemptions threaten public health is preposterous. Where are the plagues that should be afflicting the 46 states that have religious exemptions?
• Proponents of the repeals used public health as a cover for intense and obvious hatred of faith and people of faith who refuse to put obeying government first.
• The GRACE Act is completely in line with federal law and the Constitution.
• If it is passed into law, it would be unthinkable for the Supreme Court to overturn a law codifying the free exercise of religion.
• The Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) of 1993 requires the federal government to deny funds to states or institutions that discriminate based on religion.
• Religious liberty is guaranteed at the federal level, setting a legal floor that all states must recognize.
• Religious protection supersedes state health policy as a matter of law at the federal level and in all states.
• States have the right to pass health laws as they see fit, but not in violation of religious protection.
• The U.S. Second Circuit Court Appeals has ruled that Congress does not recognize religious objections to vaccines as a constitutional right; the GRACE Act will change that.
• There must be a balance between religious liberty and public health law, not a dominance of health law stomping out religious liberty.