This year, Florida climbed to the top spot in the ranking as the best state for religious freedom, earning a score of 74.6% and surpassing Illinois, which held the No. 1 position in 2024.
The annual “Religious Liberty in the States” report, produced by the Center for Religion, Culture, and Democracy at the First Liberty Institute, is co-authored by Mark David Hall and Paul D. Mueller.
The report analyzed 47 safeguards for religious freedom across states, including issues such as euthanasia refusal, insurance mandates, minors' alcohol use, clergy reporting, foster parent requirements, religious absentee voting, and clergy nonparticipation in weddings.
According to the report, “Florida is an exemplar for how state legislators can improve their state's protection of religious liberty.”
The report states, “When we began the project, Florida protected a respectable 58 percent of the eleven safeguards we considered in 2022 and was ranked sixth in the nation. Today, it protects 75 percent of the twenty safeguards we consider and ranks first. Most of its improvement derived from legislation strengthening its medical conscience protections in 2023 and legislation protecting houses of worship from discriminatory treatment during pandemics and other emergencies in 2022.”
Montana ranked second with a score of 70.6%, followed by Illinois at 68.8%, Ohio at 66.9%, Mississippi at 66.4%, Arkansas at 62.9%, and South Carolina at 60.8%.
The report highlights that Illinois’ score declined by 11 percentage points from 2024 to 2025, having previously scored 85% in 2023 and 81% last year.
Researchers note that “almost all of Illinois's religious liberty protections were adopted between 1934 and 1998,” and state that “religious freedom now seems more tenuous in the Land of Lincoln” because the state has not implemented new protections seen in other states.
The report states, “Although still among the top five states, Illinois fell from its first-place position in RLS 2023 and 2024. It now protects only 69 percent of the safeguards we consider, whereas in 2022 it protected 81 percent of them.”
For the third consecutive year, West Virginia ranked last with a score of only 19.6%, down from 24.7% last year and 14% in 2023. Wyoming is the second-worst state with a score of 23.3%, followed by Michigan at 27.4%, Nebraska at 29.1%, and Vermont at 29.3%.
The report emphasizes that about 76% of states (38) have adopted fewer than half of the analyzed religious liberty safeguards. Since the inaugural report in 2022, Montana has emerged as the most improved state, increasing its score by 30.8% to 71%, mainly due to passage of increased conscience protections.
South Carolina's score increased by 29.6%, making it second among the most improved, followed by Florida, which saw a 17% rise from 2022 to 2025, ranking third.
Conversely, Mississippi experienced the most significant decline among all states, with its score falling by 15.4% since 2022, mainly due to a lack of newly enacted religious liberty safeguards.
