Abbot Justin Brown and his fellow monks are being threatened with crippling fines and even jail time. Their crime? Selling caskets.
Today, they are fighting back in a big way.
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In 1889, a group of monks from Indiana fulfilled their dream of establishing a monastery in the Gulf South. The monastic lifestyle they embody is simple and contemplative. Their creation, the Saint Joseph Abbey, has had a powerful and positive impact in Louisiana.
For several centuries, monks have supported themselves financially by excelling at common trades such as farming and brewing beer. The monks at Saint Joseph Abbey have been able to preserve and maintain their quiet lifestyle through farming and harvesting timber.
The monks make simple wooden caskets in which to bury themselves. In the early 1990s, Bishops began requesting the caskets, which led to inquiries from other interested people. The demand continued to build: People were eager to share in the monks’ view of the simplicity and unity of life and death through burial in a simple monastic casket.
As Abbot Justin Brown puts it:
The monks of Saint Joseph Abbey have been making caskets for over a hundred years. People who ask for them want to share in that noble simplicity that our coffins express. We’re not a wealthy monastery and we need the income that Saint Joseph Woodworks could generate for the health care and the education of our own monks.
On November 1, 2007, the monks opened their Saint Joseph Woodworks. But before they could sell even one casket, they were threatened with crippling fines, jail time and even a lawsuit.
Why?
Because the Louisiana funeral industry cartel had no interest in the competition. Even from a small group of monks.
To sell caskets legally, the monks would have to convert their monastery into a “funeral establishment” which means adding all sorts of needless equipment for things like embalming human remains. Further, the monks would have to apprentice with a cartel member for a full year and then take a government-approved casket test.
Keep in mind, a casket is just a box.
Curiously, in Louisiana it is perfectly legal to bury a human body straight into the ground. You can also wrap a bed sheet around a human body and bury it. And you can make your own casket. Or you can use a casket made by a friend or stranger – so long as you don’t pay for it.
But it’s illegal to pay for a casket…unless that casket is made by a member of the cartel.
This March, the State Board of Embalmers and Funeral Directors subpoenaed two members of the Saint Joseph Abbey – Abbot Justin Brown and Deacon Mark Coudrain. If found guilty, the Abbot and Deacon will be subject to 180 days in jail and thousands of dollars in fines.
To clarify: The funeral cartel in Louisiana is attacking monks that make simple caskets for people that want them, which helps cover the cost of the monks’ monastic lifestyle. And for the “sin” of selling these caskets, the monks face crippling fines and even jail.
If monks are being attacked, nobody is safe.
Economic liberty is important to everyone. Yet countless entrepreneurs today are being kicked out of work or threatened with fines and jail because powerful industry insiders have teamed up with politicians to make laws that create cartels.
Thankfully, the monks are fighting back. Today, they teamed up with the Institute for Justice – the nation’s leading legal advocate for economic liberty – to file a major federal lawsuit.
This case has powerful national implications because it focuses on one of the most important unresolved questions in constitutional law: May the government suppress your basic right to earn a living simply to protect a politically powerful group from competition?
Our courts are split on this issue. The 6th and 9th Circuit courts have said that protectionism is unconstitutional. But the 10th Circuit court holds that protectionism is not just constitutional, but a “national pastime” of state legislatures.
The 5th Circuit – which includes Louisiana – has been silent. The monks’ case presents an ideal opportunity for the Supreme Court to finally address the constitutionality of economic protectionism – a terrible practice that affects countless Americans every day.
As IJ Senior Attorney Jeff Rowes says in the video above:
The brothers of Saint Joseph Abbey are ready to go all the way to the Supreme Court if that’s what it takes to restore economic liberty to grassroots entrepreneurs everywhere.
We are confident that the monks will win this case. And in doing so, they will vindicate important principles of liberty. Simply put, everyone deserves the freedom to earn an honest living free from arbitrary and outrageous government regulations.
For more on the monks’ lawsuit, click here.
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