Legislative findings.

The Legislature finds all of the following:

(1) Alabama provides state licensed child placing services through various state, charitable, religious, and private organizations.

(2) Religious organizations, in particular, have a lengthy and distinguished history of providing child placing services that predate government involvement.

(3) Religious organizations have long been licensed and should continue to contract with and be licensed by the state to provide child placing services.

(4) The faith of the people of the United States has always played a vital role in efforts to serve the most vulnerable, and this chapter seeks to ensure that people of any faith, or no faith at all, are free to serve children and families who are in need in ways consistent with the communities that first inspired their service.

(5) Religious organizations display particular excellence when providing child placing services.

(6) Religious organizations cannot provide certain child placing services without receiving a state license.

(7) Child placing agencies, both individuals and organizations, have the inherent, fundamental, and inalienable right to free exercise of religion protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.

(8) The Alabama Religious Freedom Amendment, Amendment 622 to the Constitution of Alabama of 1901, now appearing as Section 3.01 of the Official Recompilation of the Constitution of Alabama of 1901, as amended, protects the free exercise of religious rights of Alabama citizens by prohibiting the government from burdening the freedom of religion of a person unless the burden is in furtherance of a compelling governmental interest and is done in the least restrictive means.

(9) The right to free exercise of religion for child placing agencies includes the freedom to refrain from conduct that conflicts with their sincerely held religious beliefs.

(10) Children and families benefit greatly from the child placing services provided by religious organizations.

(11) Ensuring that religious organizations can continue to provide child placing services will benefit the children and families that receive those services.

(12) The state provides child placing services through individual licensed child placing agencies with varying religious beliefs.

(13) Because state and private entities provide child placing services through many entities, each with varying religious beliefs or no religious beliefs, the religiously compelled inability of the entities to provide child placement will not prevent any particular individual from alternative equal access to child placing services.

(14) There is no compelling reason to require a child placing agency to violate its sincerely held religious beliefs in providing any service, since alternative access to the services is equally available.

(15) This chapter implements remedial measures that are congruent and proportional to protecting the constitutional rights of child placing agencies guaranteed under the First, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution.

(16) This chapter is not intended to limit or deny the eligibility of any individual to adopt a child or participate in foster care.

(Act 2017-213, §2.)