A Kentucky Baptist church has asked the Supreme Court for assistance in its effort to recoup attorney fees and court costs after winning one of the first injunctions against a governor’s ban on in-church worship during the COVID-19 lockdowns.

Maryville Baptist Church in Louisville has asked the high court to decide if the church’s due process rights were violated in the denial of repayment for legal expenses in its injunction lawsuit. A group of congregants who filed a separate lawsuit over the worship ban was granted compensation for legal costs, but not the church.

“Here the Court can compare side-by-side two cases involving the same facts, same law, same injunction, same judicial panel, but different results,” the church’s petition reads.

In May 2020, Maryville Baptist Church won the nation’s first COVID-related injunction issued by a federal appeals court over Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear’s March 2020 ban on large in-person gatherings, including “faith based” meetings.

But church members who had filed a similar lawsuit were granted “prevailing party” status by a federal court and were allowed to recoup attorney’s fees and legal costs, unlike the church itself.

The church appealed to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for not being given the same treatment. The appellate court initially agreed and remanded the case back to a lower court, but the district court again denied the church its compensation.

The 6th Circuit later affirmed the lower court’s decision, after the Supreme Court ruled in 2024 that winning a preliminary injunction — like the church and the congregants had done — doesn’t determine “prevailing party” status and fee compensation.

“The facts, the Church, the Pastor, and the people were the same. The Governor’s unconstitutional orders were the same. The preliminary injunctions were the same. The right to prevailing party status vested the same. The results should have been the same,” the church’s lawyers say in their Supreme Court petition.

Meanwhile, Mr. Beshear, a Democrat and the named defendant in the case, is urging the justices not to consider the church’s plea. He says in his filing that the church is conflating its case with the congregants’, which had different facts.

“Throughout the pendency of this case, Petitioners have inappropriately commingled its facts,” the governor’s filing reads. “Here, the preliminary injunctions did not afford Petitioners all the relief they sought: a permanent injunction allowing them to indefinitely attend in-person Sunday services.”

The case is Maryville Baptist Church v. Beshear.

It would take four justices to vote in favor of hearing the case for oral arguments to be scheduled during the 2025-2026 term, which begins in October.

For more information, visit The Washington Times COVID-19 resource page.

• Alex Swoyer can be reached at aswoyer@washingtontimes.com.