New York Should Not Force Amish to Choose Between Their Faith and Their Farms, the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons Urges the Supreme Court

TUCSON, Ariz., Nov. 03, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- In its second recent trip to the U.S. Supreme Court, Amish in New York State seek restoration of a religious exemption from school vaccine mandates that its legislature repealed in 2019 by enacting N.Y. Pub. Health Law § 2164. Several other states, led by California, have also repealed their religious exemption, while most states continue to allow this exemption.

On Monday, the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) filed its amicus brief support of the Amish, in Miller v. McDonald (No. 26-438). Simple Amish elementary schools have been fined a total of more than $100,000 for not proving vaccination of its schoolchildren.

AAPS explained to the High Court that “the Amish educational system is central to their faith, as this Court recognized in Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205 (1972). To deny certiorari here would be to signal the end of the Amish way of life, which this Court defended in Yoder.”

Included in New York’s requirements are vaccines for illnesses non-existent in the U.S., or not contagious in a school setting.

“To destroy the Amish communities in New York by demanding vaccination violating their conscience is contrary to the religious liberty on which our country was founded,” states AAPS General Counsel Andrew Schlafly, who authored its amicus brief.

Nearly two dozen amicus briefs, including the one filed by AAPS, have been lodged with the Supreme Court in support of the Amish. These entities, which include a coalition of 17 states and the Arizona legislature, urge the Supreme Court to take up this case by granting certiorari.

“At the height of the crisis of World War II, this Court considered the religious liberty of a schoolchild to be important enough to grant certiorari on an issue that the Court had just addressed three years earlier,” AAPS’s brief reminded the Court by referencing its decision in West Virginia State Bd. of Educ. v. Barnette (1943). There the Court sided with Jehovah’s Witnesses, and here the Court should side with the Amish,” Mr. Schlafly added.

The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) is a national organization representing physicians in all specialties since 1943.

Contact: Andrew Schlafly, (908) 719-8608, aschlafly@aol.com