A law aimed at abuse has now become a weapon against faith

America’s genius has always been its willingness to protect unpopular expression, including fringe religions

- ALAN DERSHOWITZ GUEST CONTRIBUTOR

ON MY OFFICE wall hangs a framed copy of George Washington's 1790 letter to the Hebrew congregation of Newport, R.I. In it, America’s first president promised that the new nation would “give to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance.” It was more than a gesture of tolerance. It was a radical pledge that this country would never criminalize belief.

More than two centuries later, that promise is being tested again — this time not in a church or a synagogue, but in a federal courtroom in Brooklyn.

In the United States vs. Cherwitz et al., federal prosecutors cited the Trafficking Victims Protection Act — a law designed to stop modern slavery — to convict members of a spiritual community called OneTaste. The group’s alleged crime? Leading a practice known as “orgasmic meditation,” which the government claimed amounted to “forced labor” because some participants were psychologically manipulated. No allegations of violence. No threats. No physical restraint. The prosecutors simply argued that influence and belief — that elusive, human web of persuasion and trust — was itself coercion.

That is not what Congress meant when it passed the Trafficking Victims Protection Act in 2000. The law was intended for victims of real trafficking: people forced or tricked into labor or sex work under threat of harm. It was never meant to punish those who freely joined a community, or to turn regret into retroactive victimhood.