In Landor v. Louisiana Department of Corrections and Public Safety, (Sup. Ct., June 23, 2026), the U.S. Supreme Court in a 6-3 decision held that a Rastafarian inmate whose knee-length hair was forcibly shaved by prison guards does not have a claim for damages under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act against the guards in their private capacities. The majority's holding turns on the fact that RLUIPA was enacted under Congress' taxing and spending power. The majority said in part:
As a condition of funding, Congress called on state prison systems to agree to answer suits by private plaintiffs alleging substantial burdens on their religious exercises. Specifically, the law asked those systems to consent to suit by any injured party “assert[ing] a violation of” RLUIPA and seeking “appropriate relief.” §2000cc–2(a)....
Under the Spending Clause, Congress lacks regulatory authority to impose liability on [the officers] directly and must depend instead on consent. And because they never agreed to answer suits like this one, Mr. Landor’s case cannot proceed against them any more than a breach of contract action might proceed against a defendant who never formed a contract....
Under the Spending Clause, Congress’s power to spend money does not include the power to regulate. Spending Clause statutes can bind only those who voluntarily and knowingly undertake obligations by agreement with the federal government. Because that essential element is missing here, we affirm the judgment of the Fifth Circuit.
Justice Jackson, joined by Justices Sotomayor and Kagan filed a dissenting opinion, saying in part:
Neither respondents nor the Court contests Congress’s power to impose RLUIPA’s substantive directive accommodating religious freedom. The majority nevertheless adopts the peculiar position that Congress is powerless to create, and a State is powerless to accept, the natural next step: a damages remedy against officials who violate that directive.
This severance of rights and remedies is a sleight of hand; it comes by way of the majority’s full-throated endorsement of a contract analogy even though what secures the rights at issue is not a contract but a law. Today’s decision magically transforms a federal statute into an invitation to be accepted or declined, deemed binding only if each particular defendant has explicitly agreed to be penalized. No matter that laws, as opposed to contracts, don’t ordinarily work
