compelling governmental interest.” 42 U.S.C. § 2000cc-l(a). It is well-established that “ 'the failure in a complaint to cite a statute, or to cite the correct one, in no way affects the merits of a claim. Factual allegations alone are what matters.’ " Northrop v. Hoffman of Simsbury, Inc., 134 F.3d 41, 46 (2d Cir.1997) (quoting Albert v. Carovano, 851 F.2d 561, 571 n. 3 (2d Cir.1988) (en banc)); see also Newman v. Silver, 713 F.2d 14, 15 n. 1 (2d Cir.1983) ("[Fjederal pleading ... is by statement of claim, not by legal theories.”); Brown v. City of Oneonta, 235 F.3d 769, 783 & n. 4 (Calabresi, J., dissenting from denial of rehearing en banc) (same). 3 . Although McEachin does not name the guard as a defendant, further inquiry into whether this pro se plaintiff was, indeed Cir.1997) (<HOLDING>) ("We recognize[ ] that requiring a believer to
holding that denial of inmates request for bread and peanut butter so that he could prepare his sunday meals in his cell on saturday  thereby avoiding preparing food or benefitting from the preparation of food by others on the sabbath  violated prisoners free exercise rights holding that prisons policy of supplying orthodox jewish inmates with one frozen kosher dinner supplemented with nonkosher vegetarian or nonpork meals violated prisoners free exercise rights holding a muslim prisoners free exercise claim failed because even though the prison did not provide him with halal meat he could comply with his religious requirements by simply eating a vegetarian meal and therefore the disputed policy did not force the prisoner to violate his religion holding that prison officials failure to accommodate inmates meal requirements during ramadan violated his free exercise rights holding that when an inmates religious views requiring a vegetarian diet are sincerely held prison policy may violate his free exercise rights even though vegetarianism is only a recommended not a required element of plaintiffs religion seventhday adventism