When an Amish woman living in Indiana sought to become a permanent U.S. resident in 2015, a minor step for most applicants became a potentially insurmountable hurdle, sparking a debate about when government procedure should make room for deeply held religious beliefs.

Even though she was married to a U.S. citizen and generally met the criteria for permanent status, she was rejected because her religion did not allow for her to be photographed.

However, the woman and her husband, who filed a lawsuit under the names Jane and John Doe due to Amish prohibitions on drawing attention to oneself, reached a settlement with the government on May 23, allowing Jane Doe to stay in the country with her husband and their 13 children, and to be identified using fingerprints instead of photographs.

While her attorney characterized the case as a victory for the family, it also highlights the ways in which Amish can be vulnerable when their religious beliefs conflict with the law or the policies of government agencies.

"Individuals with sincerely held religious beliefs should not be forced into filing litigation to have the federal government accommodate those beliefs," said Michael Sampson, an attorney at Reed Smith LLP who represented the couple in a suit against the government, noting that litigation can be expensive and can also conflict with Amish beliefs.

Over 300,000 Amish people live in North America, according to the Amish Studies center at Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania. While religious beliefs can vary greatly among different churches in Old Order Amish communities, in general Amish people make limited and selective use of more modern technologies, emphasize the importance of family and community, and believe in practicing nonviolence.

Many Amish also believe that photographs violate the Second Commandment's prohibition of graven images — a belief that put Jane Doe and her husband at odds with immigration officials.

Jane Doe, who was living in an Old Order Amish community in Canada, entered the U.S. legally and married her husband after the death of his first wife, according to the complaint. John Doe had 11 children from his first marriage, and the couple had two more after they were married, the complaint said.

However, the family of 15 faced the prospect of being divided or having to move to Canada after Jane Doe's application for permanent resident status was rejected.

Sampson said that this type of situation isn't uncommon, saying that he handled a similar case on behalf of another couple in 2010 and knows of other individuals in similar situations across the country.

"While I don't think it's an everyday event, I think it occurs with more frequency than perhaps we might imagine, because as I understand it, individuals from the United States who are Old Order Amish do marry individuals from Canada who are Old Order Amish with some regularity," he said.

The situation is complicated, he said, by the fact that many Amish people do not believe in filing lawsuits.

Mark Louden, a linguistics professor at the University of Wisconsin who speaks the traditional Amish language Pennsylvania Dutch and has acted as a court interpreter and cultural mediator for Amish people, said that lawsuits are typically seen by the Amish as aggressive, and that filing them is therefore frowned on by the communities, which value nonviolence and nonresistance.

Amish people will generally agree to testify if called and will cooperate with prosecutors who bring a case on their behalf, but they typically do not try to press charges or file lawsuits, he said.

Richard Muntz, an attorney from Indiana who frequently represents Amish clients, said that was his experience with the Amish as well.

"Typically, they do not start lawsuits," Muntz said.

Most of the work he does for Amish clients consists of things like wills and estate planning, he said, but liability suits involving accidents — such as a crash involving a car and a horse and buggy — also come up regularly. He's also filed personal injury or wrongful death suits for Amish clients, but usually in cases where a family had expenses and no other options, he said.

Muntz, who estimates he's been taking Amish clients for 45 years, said that in the past many clients would refuse to even defend lawsuits filed against them, even if he considered the claims to be bogus. That has changed somewhat, he said, but the aversion to lawsuits remains.

Louden noted that the Amish usually don't have much money, meaning it's rare for private citizens to target them, but he said that the reluctance to engage the courts can be a problem when it comes to asserting their religious freedoms.

Often times, he said, state governments are willing to work with Amish communities to find accommodations, but things don't always work out.

Even a landmark religious freedom case in the 1970s, which gave Amish communities more control over their children's education, was mostly pursued by attorneys who specialized in religious freedom work, he said. In fact, some people still today are uncomfortable with the fact that several Amish families cooperated with the lawsuit at all.

Muntz said that this aversion to the courts can make Amish communities vulnerable.

Sampson agreed. In trying to negotiate with the government on behalf of Jane Doe, he said, Sampson and his co-counsel spent years unable to make much headway. It was only once they filed a lawsuit that things began to change.

"That is something that really frustrated me," he said. "Nothing changed between the time we started and the time we ended, other than that we filed litigation."

He described the process as like playing a game of chicken with the government.

"I don't want to ascribe motives or thinking to the government, but there may have been an assumption that we would just go away or they could wait us out," he said. "Once we filed litigation, that changed, and they began to work with us in earnest to resolve this matter."

But he said this case might be a guidepost for future situations.

"[The Does'] hope and my hope is that their experience here will help other Old Order Amish who might face similar circumstances, and might negate the need to file litigation," he said.

Attorneys for the government did not respond to a request for comment.

--Editing by Brian Baresch.

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