HIGH COURT BACKS SECT'S RIGHT TO USE HALLUCINOGEN

WASHINGTON -- Federal narcotics laws don't trump the
religious-expression rights of a Brazilian-based sect that uses a
hallucinogenic tea in a sacrament, the Supreme Court ruled.

The decision was one of a host of actions the court took upon
returning from a monthlong recess after the 58-42 Senate confirmation
of Justice Samuel Alito. The justices also heard arguments on the
scope of the Clean Water Act; declined the Bush administration's
request to dismiss a challenge to special military courts it set up
in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to try suspected foreign terrorists; and
affirmed the power of contractual-arbitration clauses.

The religion case marked the most significant opinion to date by
Chief Justice John Roberts, who last year succeeded the late William
Rehnquist. American adherents of the Brazilian religious sect, O
Centro Espirita Beneficente Uniao do Vegetal, sought to import their
sacramental tea, hoasca, whose ingredients include a hallucinogenic
plant from the Amazon region.

But the narcotic is banned by the federal Controlled Substances Act,
and federal authorities threatened to prosecute the sect after
intercepting a hoasca shipment. The sect, which claims about 130
members in the U.S., filed suit, and a federal district judge in New
Mexico issued a preliminary injunction against the government. The
judge, affirmed by the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver,
cited the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which bars the
government from imposing "substantial burdens" on the free exercise
of religion, even under a generally applicable law, unless it is the
least restrictive way to achieve a compelling government interest.

In rejecting the wholesale ban on hoasca, Chief Justice Roberts noted
that the government has exempted American Indians from a similar
prohibition on peyote, used in some Native American ceremonies.

Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficente Uniao do Vegetal

In the Clean Water Act arguments, developers from Michigan contended
that the federal government exceeded its authority by attempting to
regulate property too far from the "navigable waters" of the U.S.

Justice Antonin Scalia sounded sympathetic to their complaint,
challenging the government's lawyer, Solicitor General Paul Clement,
for including "storm drains and ditches" within the definition of
navigable waters and their adjoining wetlands and tributaries. "I
suggest it's very absurd to call that 'waters of the United States,'
" Justice Scalia said.

Justice David Souter suggested that effective regulation of water
pollution required a broad view of which lands fall under federal
authority. A ruling for the developers could significantly curtail
federal authority over development projects.

Rapanos v. U.S.; Carabell v. Army Corps of Engineers

Last year, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a challenge from a
Guantanamo prisoner to the system of special courts, called military
commissions, that President Bush established to try suspected foreign
terrorists. In December, however, Congress passed the Detainee
Treatment Act that recognized, for the first time, the existence of
the commissions and set up procedures for convicted prisoners to appeal.

The Bush administration contended that law rendered the pending case
moot, and that it therefore should be dismissed. The court decided to
go ahead with arguments on March 28, but left open the possibility it
might accept the government's position after the hearing.

Hamdan v. Rumsfeld

The court again bolstered the binding nature of contractual
arbitration provisions, overturning a Florida Supreme Court opinion
that let consumers challenge an allegedly invalid contract in state
court rather than before a private arbitrator. "Unless the challenge
is to the arbitration clause itself, the issue of the contract's
validity is considered by the arbitrator in the first instance,"
Justice Scalia wrote for a seven-member majority.