The Marines’ argument that allowing religious exemptions would weaken the unit’s cohesion was rejected by a US Federal Appeals court on Friday, and the Marines were now required to allow Sikh recruits to keep their beards and don turbans. Further, the US Federal Appeals Court cited the Marine rule current rule for not allowing Sikh recruits to don beards and turban as the violation of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA).
US court orders Marines to allow Sikh recruits with beards and turbans
The US Army, Navy, Air Force, and Coast Guard, as well as many other armies, already comply with the Sikhism’s religious standards. Sikhism is a religion that originated in South Asia five centuries ago that prevents males from shaving or trimming their beards and mandates the wearing of turbans.
Marine Corps had refused to provide any grooming standards to three Sikh recruits during 13 weeks basic training and during potential combat periods
However, the Marine Corps refused to provide any exceptions to grooming standards during the 13 weeks of basic training and during potential combat periods in response to three Sikhs who passed examinations to enlist last year. However, the three could still wear beards and turbans at other times.
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Marine Leadership has argued that in order to undergo a “psychological change” toward shared sacrifice, recruits needed to be “stripped of their identity
The Marines did not make any claims that beards and turbans would compromise safety or physically obstruct training, according to a three-judge panel of the US Court of Appeals in Washington, who disagreed. The court pointed out that the Marines allowed women to keep their hairstyles, spared men with razor bumps, a skin ailment, from shaving, and broadly accepted tattoos — “a quintessential manifestation of individual identity.”
Judge Patricia Millett, who was appointed by former president Barack Obama, wrote the ruling. “If the need to develop unit cohesion during recruit training can accommodate some external indicia of individuality, then whatever line is drawn cannot turn on whether those indicia are prevalent in society or instead reflect the faith practise of a minority,” she wrote.
The court also emphasised that Marines with beards were not a problem prior to the Revolutionary War and up until the present. Regulations regarding beards only go back to 1976.
Although military procedures might change, the decision stated that any assertion of “inflexible need” cannot “totally reject past practise.”
While a district court more thoroughly considers the matter, the court ordered a preliminary injunction allowing two of the recruits, Milaap Singh Chahal and Jaskirat Singh, to start training with their articles of faith.
Sikh Coalition Advocacy Group has applauded the decision
The appeals court agreed with the third petitioner, Aekash Singh, that his case had substance but noted that he appeared to have put off enlisting. The Sikh Coalition advocacy group’s senior staff attorney Giselle Klapper applauded the decision, stating it meant “faithful Sikhs who are called to serve our country can now do so in the US Marine Corps.”
The US Federal Appeals Court was hearing the case pertaining to three Sikh men who passed named Aekash Singh, Jaskirat Singh and Milaap Singh Chahal who passed tests to enlist in the US Marine last year.
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