I

Spirituality

Treif Ordinance

Conservative rabbi says Georgia's kosher law unconstitutional.

Sue Fishkoff
Jewish Telegraphic Agency

San Francisco

A

Conservative rabbi in Georgia
is challenging the constitu-
tionality of his state's kosher
law, saying it favors Orthodox religious
standards and constitutes state entan-
glement in religion.
Michigan has a similar law.
The case follows the overturning of
similar kosher laws in two other states
and the city of Baltimore. It also comes
at a time of growing public inter-
est in kashrut, following last year's
immigration raid at
the Agriprocessors
meatpacking plant in
Postville, Iowa, and
the ongoing trials of
the plant's owners and
managers.
Last month, Rabbi
Shalom Lewis of
Shalom Lewis
Congregation Etz
Chaim in Marietta filed
a lawsuit in Fulton County Superior
Court claiming that Georgia's Kosher
Food Labeling Act, passed in 1980, pre-
vents him from fulfilling his duties as a
rabbi.
In a complaint filed on Lewis' behalf,
the American Civil Liberties Union
charges that Georgia's kosher law, which
defines "kosher food" as "food prepared
under and of products sanctioned by
the Orthodox Hebrew religious rules
and requirements," ignores different
kosher standards of other streams of
Judaism.
The Georgia law imposes criminal
sanctions for violations of the law,
including presenting food as kosher
if it has not been so determined by
Orthodox authorities.
Thus, the lawsuit contends, the law
as written violates the free exercise,
establishment, equal protection and due
process clauses of the U.S. and Georgia
constitutions.
The case is the fourth of its kind
nationwide. Kosher laws that used
similar Orthodox definitions of "kosher
food" were overturned in New Jersey in
1992, Baltimore in 1995 and New York

local vegetarian restaurant under
Conservative supervision received
a complaining call from the Atlanta
Kashruth Commission, a charge Stein
denied.
Rabbi Julie Schonfeld, executive
director of the Rabbinical Association,
the professional body of Conservative
rabbis, said Lewis' lawsuit is "part and
parcel" of the Conservative rabbinate's
ongoing engagement in kashrut.
Many Conservative rabbis give kosher
supervision and cer-
tification nationwide,
she said, and the
movement holds peri-
odic courses to teach
Conservative rabbis
how to perform this
No Enforcement
function. The next one
Lewis noted that no
is scheduled for May
Conservative rabbi,
2010.
including himself, has
"His proactive
been prosecuted under
stance is consistent
the law, but said "it could
with the activ-
happen:' and as a tax-
ist stance towards
payer, he did not want to
kashrut in our move-
help fund a law that dis-
ment," she said,
criminates in this way.
noting in particular
Rabbi Reuven Stein,
the Conservative
director of supervision
movement's year-old
at the Atlanta Kashruth
Commission, said he was "disappointed" commission on Hekhsher Tzedek, or
certificate of social justice, an initiative
to learn of the lawsuit. He said the law
to rate kosher-certified food products
was enacted in 1980 to protect kosher
according to standards of health, safety
consumers from fraud, and unlike the
and working conditions.
kosher laws struck down in New York
"We very much have an eye on the
and New Jersey, Georgia's law provides
larger society, how we live as Jews in
no enforcement mechanism.
America," she said. "Hekhsher Tzedek is
"It's toothless anyway," Stein said,
a clear example of that and this case is
which is why he was "surprised" anyone
another very fine one
would complain about it.
Conservative Judaism holds that
Furthermore, he said, nothing in the
the
laws of kashrut are binding and in
law prevents a Conservative rabbi from
general
follows the same kosher laws as
giving hekhsherim, or kosher certifica-
Orthodoxy.
The movement differs only
tion, in contrast to what Lewis charges
in
the
practical
application of certain
in his suit.
laws,
notably
the
Orthodox restric-
"Conservative rabbis do give hekh-
tions
on
non-Jews
making cheese and
sherim in the state of Georgia, and we've
wine and lighting cooking fires, which
never had an issue with it," Stein said.
Conservative authorities do not follow.
Stein said he receives "at least a call
Conservative authorities also permit
a month" from consumers regarding
certain fish, such as sturgeon and
kosher fraud or mislabeling. If the law
swordfish, forbidden by the Orthodox.
were overturned, he said, it's unlikely
a "more politically correct one" would
replace it, and consumers would have no Laws Overturned
In July 1992, New Jersey's Supreme
protection.
Court overturned state kosher regula-
Lewis claimed the owner of a

in 2003.
Daniel Mach, director of litigation
for the ACLU Program on Freedom of
Religion and Belief, said the arguments
in the Georgia case will refer to those
rulings.
Lewis provides kosher supervision to
a restaurant and bakery and acts as ray
hamachshir, or senior kosher supervisor,
of kosher events held in his synagogue.
He said he brought the suit because the
kosher law in Georgia criminalizes his
actions.
"Technically, I've been
a criminal since 1980,
which I'm not thrilled
about," he said.

Many
Conservative
rabbis give kosher
supervision and
certification
nationwide.

tions that defined kosher in terms of
"Orthodox Hebrew religious require-
ments:' ruling that it violated the con-
stitutional prohibition on the establish-
ment of religion.
New Jersey now operates under a "full
disclosure scheme whereby manufac-
turers or purveyors of kosher food must
fill out forms indicating what they sell
and under whose authority. The forms
are filed with the state and posted for
public view, so consumers can decide
for themselves whether to patronize the
establishment.
The disclosure form is careful not to
make religious judgments. Purveyors
must state, for example, whether they
sell pork or shellfish, or mix milk and
meat, but they can still call themselves
kosher as long as they don't conceal
these facts.
"You can put down absolutely any-
thing in the world you want:' said Rabbi
Yakov Dombroff, who has headed New
Jersey's Bureau of Kosher Enforcement
since 1986. "Literally, pork could be
kosher. The state has no interest in what
you call kosher as long as you're in com-
pliance with the disclosure
In 1995, the Baltimore City Code's
kosher ordinance was overturned as
being in violation of the Establishment
Clause after a hot dog vendor was fined
for putting non-kosher hot dogs too
close to kosher ones on his rotisserie.
Nearly a decade later, in 2004, New
York State changed its kosher laws,
which also defined kosher as "according
to Orthodox Hebrew religious require-
ments," following a lawsuit brought by
butchers in Commack. In their original
1996 case, the butchers claimed state
kosher supervisions were engaged
in a regular pattern of fining them
because their store was supervised by a
Conservative rabbi.
The New York State Kosher Law
Protection Act of 2004, modeled on New
Jersey's "full disclosure" system, requires
producers, distributors and retailers of
food sold as kosher in the state to sub-
mit information about their products,
including the identity of the person or
organization that certifies them, to the
Department of Agriculture and Markets.
The information is published in an
online directory. ❑

JIN

September 24 • 2009 39