The Supreme Court's new conservative super-majority has thoroughly muddled the question of whether local or state governments have a right to impose public-health restrictions, such as gathering limits during the pandemic, on places of worship. Since the pandemic rages out of control, and life-and-death questions persist about the limits of state intervention, this legal debate will be ongoing despite Wednesday's ruling rejecting New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's authority to limit the size of gatherings when First Amendment religious rights come into play.

Public health and safety are questions that lie entirely within the domain of the state for very good and practical reasons. The Supreme Court's 5-4 temporary ruling screams for clarification because it already is being interpreted by some religious leaders as meaning government has no authority whatsoever to tell churches, synagogues or mosques and what they are permitted to do in any context. That interpretation flies in the face of decades of clearly established law regarding public health and safety priorities.

When religious institutions want to build on their own land, they must apply for building permits just like any other entity. All safety codes apply. When they propose to tie their bathrooms into the city's water and sewer system, or link their circuit-breaker boxes to the public electrical grid, they necessarily subject themselves to the same rigorous inspection regimes that everyone else must abide by.

These rules are in place not because godless bureaucrats are constantly looking for cracks in the First Amendment wall to invade the sovereign space of religious institutions. They exist because people can die when electrical circuits are miswired and fire escapes aren't up to code. These are, in short, critical public health issues where government authority has always and must continue to reign supreme.

Yet, when it comes to mass gatherings during the pandemic, some clergy members think their faithful should get an automatic First Amendment free pass. A leader of one ultra-Orthodox Jewish group, Rabbi Chaim Dovid Zwiebel, welcomed Wednesday's ruling as effectively declaring a free-for-all in which "religious institutions will be protected from government edicts."

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn sought Supreme Court intervention after Cuomo imposed restrictions on indoor mass gatherings to avert another deadly coronavirus outbreak.

Chief Justice John Roberts had already signaled a reluctance to override government authority, stating previously that public health officials "should not be subject to second-guessing by an unelected federal judiciary, which lacks the background, competence and expertise to assess public health and is not accountable to the people."

His sound reasoning was bulldozed by the new, reckless conservative majority, which allowed its narrow focus on religious freedoms to cloud the overwhelming necessity to let public officials do their jobs. Since religious institutions already submit to government jurisdiction on critical health and safety issues, a pandemic is no time to start backtracking.

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