Becket Goes to Court Wednesday to Block Oak Flat Transfer – Let Supreme Court Consider this Case!

Apache Stronghold v. United States

​The Oak Flat sacred site in the Tonto National Forest in Arizona has undergone a Perils of Pauline ordeal in federal courts, rescued from ruin only to be tied to the tracks again before an oncoming train.
 
This land for centuries has been the centerpiece of Apache religion and the Western Apache people’s relationship with the Creator. It is now slated to be transferred to a partially Chinese-owned mining company that plans to dig a copper mine there, mutilating a site as holy to the Apache as the Vatican is to Catholics or the Wailing Wall is to Jews. If the project proceeds, all that will be left of the Apache’s sacred land will be a crater as long as the Washington Mall and as deep as two Washington Monuments.
 
The Apache’s appeal has been repeatedly relisted for possible certiorari, or an oral argument, before the Supreme Court. Not content to wait, the U.S. government has announced its intention to jump ahead of the Court and transfer Oak Flat to the mining company, circumventing the judicial process.
 
At 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday, Luke Goodrich of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty will present an emergency motion before Judge Steven P. Logan in federal district court in Phoenix asking him to block the transfer while the Supreme Court hears the case.
 
In a dissent from the Ninth Circuit opinion now being appealed, Judge Marsha B. Berzon declared that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) should be sufficient to protect Oak Flat. She wrote that “it would be an exceedingly odd statute that recognized and provided remedies for government-created substantial burdens on religious exercise … when it directly prevents access to religious resources.” She called the current status of the case “an illogical interpretation of RFRA” and “incoherent.”
 
This case is too important to be short-circuited or ignored. Respect for RFRA is vital to people of all faiths, which is one reason why Christian, Jewish, and other groups have joined in petitioning the courts to save Oak Flat.
 
On Sunday, Apache tribal members began an 80-mile run from Oak Flat that will end in Phoenix just before the hearing. We may not be able to join them on the run, but surely we can join them in prayer.

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