Gina Donnie Brown v. Roderick Thomas Brown

How courts have described this case

Verbatim parenthetical descriptions written by other courts when citing this decision. Ranked by citation-network relevance.

• concluding that there was no equal terms violation where zoning ordinance excluded churches along with other noncommercial uses from a commercial district, while including only commercial uses
• recognizing that “[i]f a church and a community center, though different in many respects, do not differ with respect to any accepted zoning criterion, then an ordinance that allows one and forbids the other denies equality and violates the equal-terms provision”
• explaining that an equal terms claimant No. 23-1175 11 must show differential treatment from the standpoint of an “accepted zoning criterion”
• stating that “the presence of commuters might enable the district to be revitalized as a commercial center”
• finding that, with respect to traffic, “a church is more like a movie theater, which also generates groups of people coming and going at the same time”
• noting that an interpretation of the equal terms provision that is “too friendly to religious land uses” might “violat[e] the First Amendment’s prohibition against establishment of religion by discriminating in favor of religious land uses” (emphasis in original)

Source: CourtListener parenthetical corpus (CC0).