Monks' suit over caskets heads to trial

[rug]

COVINGTON, La. -- A federal lawsuit brought by a group of monks fighting for the right to sell handcrafted caskets without a state license is set to go to trial Monday (June 6) in New Orleans.

U.S. District Judge Stanwood Duval ruled in April that lawyers representing monks from St. Joseph Abbey near Covington could attempt to prove that a state law restricting casket sales to licensed funeral directors amounts to unconstitutional economic protectionism.

The monks' legal team, from the Virginia-based Institute of Justice, seeks to have that statute stricken. It expects the bench trial to last several days, said Jeffrey Rowes, the group's senior lawyer.

St. Joseph Abbey opened a woodshop in 2007 to sell handcrafted cypress funeral boxes for $1,500 to $2,000, which is cheaper than caskets from typical funeral homes. They hoped the sales would finance medical and educational needs for more than 30 monks.

http://ncronline.org/news/justice/monks-suit-over-caskets-heads-trial

[grilled onions]

1. I Hope They Win

Monks vs funeral directors(many who lean to the shady side)is no contest. Cypress wood can be very beautiful. I have a couple wall clocks made out of it.

[rug]

2. Me too. There's another group of monks in Iowa who do the same thing.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=275x7533

[CurtEastPoint]

3. The Trappists here in GA have a 'green' cemetery now.

You are buried au naturel (kinda) in the woods, with a simple marker and you return to the earth.

http://www.honeycreekwoodlands.com/

[rug]

4. Interesting. And anyone can be buried there.

[Odin2005]

7. I wanna be buried there!

[Odin2005]

5. I hope they win, fuck the Funeral Industry Cartel.

My mom is still paying off the $10,000 it cost the bury my stepdad! :grr:

[digonswine]

6. Why would one need a license to sell caskets?

Oh yeah-money

[Odin2005]

8. Like so many regulations, to protect cartels from compitition.

[darkstar3]

10. No. I know two different funeral directors, and as much as they hate the high cost of caskets,

they understand why they must be licensed. Caskets must be made to certain standards in order to ensure that nasty things don't make it into our drinking water, and I'm not just talking about human decomposition.

Let's pretend that certain metals known to leech into groundwater over a period of decades were used as hinge materials for caskets over a radius of, say, 30 miles. What might happen to the water supply of that area 50-100 years from now?

Caskets are regulated for the same reason trash is regulated, because we've realized we have to be careful about what we put in the ground.

Now, as for criminal nature of the price gouging involved, that's indefensible.

[customerserviceguy]

11. I'll admit, you've made me think about this a whole new way

and have doubled my commitment to be cremated.

[darkstar3]

12. Yeah, I'm going that route, too.

[Deep13]

14. Seems like the way to go.

I still want a big headstone that will scare people, though.

[rbixby]

13. Most cemeteries around here require a concrete vault

So the quality of the casket doesn't really matter. I've never been able to understand why though, aside from the soil subsiding when the casket biodegrades.

[Somawas]

9. That's a fascinating 14th Amendment theory.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

15. Chad Mitchell Trio - A Dying Business

It was a helluva Funeral, it was a helluva Funeral, the Finest Funeral in the Land:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNFDzxMgm5w

:rofl: