In King v. New York, (ND NY, Feb. 26, 2021), a New York federal district court rejected a wife's contention that New York's no-fault divorce law violates the Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses by infringing her Christian religious belief that marriage is permanent and cannot be dissolved by the state. The court said in part:
... [A] finding that H. King must remain married against his will because of L. King’s religious convictions would defy all logic and reason, and create a much larger Establishment Clause issue than the one L. King argues exists today....
Moreover, ... there is no constitutional injury here for the independent reason that the divorce that gave rise to this litigation only dissolved L. King’s and H. King’s legal marriage recognized by the State of New York; the divorce did not affect the status of their “religious marriage.”
