Ann Althouse:

"Consider how the two view the First Amendment. Writing for the majority in Employment Division v. Smith in 1990, Justice Scalia took the position that "neutral, generally applicable" laws do not violate the Constitution's guarantee to the free exercise of religion. Thus, he wrote, a state law could penalize the use of peyote without making any accommodation for its ritual use in the Native American Church.

Judge Alito, since he sits on a lower court, is surely bound by Smith; but in two later cases he found room to protect free exercise rights by holding the government to a tough standard about what deserves to be called a neutral, generally applicable law. In a 1999 New Jersey case, he decided in favor of two Muslim police officers who wanted to grow beards, which they cited as a religious obligation. He reached this outcome by determining that their police department's policy of banning beards was not neutral and generally applicable because it included a single exception (for people with a skin problem aggravated by shaving)."