Is Pritzker’s coronavirus levee about to break?

By JOHN KASS
CHICAGO TRIBUNE |
MAY 21, 2020 | 5:00 AM

“If you’d told me six months ago that the governor of Illinois would declare churches ‘nonessential’ and shut them down, while liquor stores are ‘essential’ and open, I’d have asked what blend of weed you were smoking,” Peter Breen of the Thomas More Society told me.
What we’ve been smoking? Fear. It’s all been tightly rolled in the scraps of the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. We’ve been inhaling deeply for months.

And the leaders of the lockdown party — Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot — are on the verge of losing control. Rookie politicians make rookie mistakes.
Pritzker’s initial stay-at-home-order, in March, did not consider worship services as essential. But after the Thomas More Society filed a lawsuit on behalf of a church in Lena, Illinois, the governor scrambled to modify his order. Pritzker allowed worship services but imposed social distancing guidelines and limited the free exercise of religion to only 10 or fewer people at a time.

The people are pushing back. The pressure builds like a rain-swollen river pushing on a levee.
Breen, a former Republican state representative from the western suburbs who represented that church
in Lena that holds services in defiance of Pritzker’s edict, told me about another case being handled by the Thomas More Society.

This one involves the Jesus House Restoration Ministries in Champaign and its pastor, the Rev. Dustin Brown. The ministry serves the homeless. State and local social welfare agencies refer ex-convicts and others in dire circumstances to the ministry. The Jesus House had been offering food and clothing and church services indoors. But with coronavirus, and wanting to maintain proper social distancing, Brown took his operation to a private outdoor parking lot. All that was OK. But once he began talking about Jesus, government had a fit. On April 20, the high priests of the local health department filed a writ against Brown and the Jesus House.

“Your business does not fall under the definition of Essential Businesses and is therefore required to cease all activities except Minimum Basic Operations,” decreed the Champaign-Urbana Public Health District in a rather ominous and stringent official notice. This was included as an exhibit in the Thomas More Society’s motion for a federal temporary restraining order against Pritzker and his edicts.
“So the pastor can pass out food and clothes, but if he preaches the gospel, he’s in violation? You see the problem?” asked Breen.

The church filed its lawsuit May 12, having found Pritzker’s modified order still lacking.
“This is a violation of the Constitution in two ways,” Breen said. “The government order violates both the free exercise of religion clause and free speech. This pastor gives out food and clothing. There is a homeless center right next to him, with no limit as to the number of people inside. Our guy, he’s outside. He can give away food and clothing, but not the churching.”
The fear was legitimate, initially, when the novel coronavirus arrived from China. As it spread, governors and mayors responded, I think wisely, given the information they had at the time, to limit transmission by shutting down what they deemed nonessential businesses like restaurants and bars.
But now, as transmission models change, many of us are still so afraid of contracting the dangerous coronavirus, or infecting others, or afraid of being denounced by the lockdown party, that an amazing thing is happening: We cheer the government and boo the pastors and their flocks. Some cheer, but not all of us. At least we can all head over to an essential liquor store or to the essential recreational marijuana store before getting the essential chips and essential queso dip from the essential grocery store for a night of binge-watching on Netflix.

Though Pritzker subsequently amended his order on April 30 to make clear worship services are essential, the order mandates a limit of no more than 10 people.
But you’ll find more than 10 people in an “essential” Home Depot on a Sunday. Call me a sinner, I’m having a hard time with that. I don’t want to become ill. And I don’t want you to become ill. But where does Pritzker get the power to demand that only 10 people may gather together anywhere? If you dare support the churches and the Constitution, you may be marginalized for not caring about the nurses and doctors in hospitals. Or someone may call you a Nazi to shame you. This is how cynical politicians shame people into silence, rather than encourage debate. And without debate, pressure builds on that levee.

Government has a choice. Send in the cops, or back off? Lightfoot’s parking ban around a small Romanian church in Chicago is one thing. I would have advised her against it, but then, she didn’t ask me. Now Willie Wilson, the millionaire and repeat mayoral candidate at odds with Lightfoot, is exhorting churches to open. The potential for confrontation builds.
Would Lightfoot dare send cops to stand in the doors of African American churches on the South or West sides? Or use cops to shut their parking lots? I doubt it.

Lightfoot, the former federal prosecutor and daughter of a steelworker, is much tougher than Pritzker. But if she thinks he’ll back her up when things get difficult, she’s wrong. He likes being called governor.On Wednesday, he pulled back his most recent edict — charging businesses with misdemeanors if they open in violation of his order. His fellow Democrats in the state legislature were feeling pressure from their constituents. He backed down rather than have his people bolt on him in Springfield.

The pushback builds. And that levee is just about to break.