IMAGE: CNS photo/Rick Wilking, Reuters
By Carol Zimmermann
WASHINGTON (CNS) — In a 7-2 decision June 4, the Supreme
Court sided with a Colorado baker in a case that put anti-discrimination laws
up against freedom of speech and freedom of religious expression.
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, writing for the majority, said
the Colorado Civil Rights Commission had violated the Constitution’s protection
of religious freedom in its ruling against the baker, who refused to make a
wedding cake for the same-sex couple.
Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor dissented.
Kennedy noted the case had a limited scope, writing that the
issue “must await further elaboration.” Across the country, appeals
in similar cases are pending, including another case at the Supreme Court from
a florist who didn’t want to provide flowers for a same-sex wedding.
The ruling in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights
Commission stems from the case argued before the court last December from an
incident in 2012 when Charlie Craig and David Mullins asked the Colorado baker,
Jack Phillips, to make a cake for their wedding reception. Phillips refused,
saying his religious beliefs would not allow him to create a cake honoring
their marriage.
The couple filed a complaint with the Colorado Civil Rights
Commission, which decided the baker’s action violated state law. The decision
was upheld by the Colorado Court of Appeals. The Colorado Supreme Court
wouldn’t take the case, letting the ruling stand. The U.S. Supreme Court agreed
to hear the case.
During oral arguments at the high court, many questions came
up about what constituted speech, since the baker claimed he should have
freedom of speech protection.
The ruling’s opinion honed in on the argument of free speech
and religious neutrality, saying the baker’s refusal was based on “sincere
religious beliefs and convictions” and when the Colorado Civil Rights
Commission considered this case, the court said, “it did not do so with
the religious neutrality that the Constitution requires.”
The court opinion also noted the delicate balance at stake
in this case, saying: “Our society has come to the recognition that gay
persons and gay couples cannot be treated as social outcasts or as inferior in
dignity and worth. For that reason, the laws and the Constitution can, and in
some instances must, protect them in the exercise of their civil rights. The
exercise of their freedom on terms equal to others must be given great weight
and respect by the courts. At the same time, the religious and philosophical
objections to gay marriage are protected views and in some instances protected
forms of expression.”
But delving further, the court deemed the specific cake in
question was an artistic creation, not just a baked good. It said, “If a
baker refused to sell any goods or any cakes for gay weddings, that would be a
different matter,” noting that the state would have a strong case that
this would be a denial of goods and services going beyond protected rights of a
baker.
Here, the court said the issue was the baker’s argument that
he “had to use his artistic skills to make an expressive statement, a
wedding endorsement in his own voice and of his own creation.”
The court opinion goes on to say that as Phillips’
contention “has a significant First Amendment speech component and
implicates his deep and sincere religious beliefs. In this context the baker
likely found it difficult to find a line where the customers’ rights to goods
and services became a demand for him to exercise the right of his own personal
expression for their message, a message he could not express in a way
consistent with his religious beliefs.”
Ginsburg, writing in her dissenting
opinion, joined by Sotomayor, stressed there are aspects of the court’s opinion
she agreed with but she “strongly” disagreed with the idea that the
same-sex couple “should lose this case” and she felt that neither the
commissioners’ statements about religion nor the commission’s treatment of
other bakers who refused to make cakes disapproving of same-sex marriage
justified a ruling in favor of Phillips.
Ashley McGuire, senior fellow
with the Catholic Association, a group that emphasizes religious freedom,
described the court’s ruling as a “clear win for religious liberty and
expression.”
In other immediate reaction: Kristen
Waggoner, senior counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom, which represented
Phillips, praised the court for showing that “government hostility toward
people of faith has no place in our society.”
Louise Melling, deputy legal
director of the American Civil Liberties Union, stressed the narrowness of the
court’s opinion, emphasizing that it was based on “concerns unique to the
case but reaffirmed its longstanding rule that states can prevent the harms of
discrimination in the marketplace, including against LGBT people.”
The
U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops filed a friend-of-the court brief in
support of the baker, joined by the Colorado Catholic Conference, Catholic Bar
Association, Catholic Medical Association, National Association of Catholic
Nurses-USA and National Catholic Bioethics Center.
After
oral arguments were presented late last year in this case, the chairmen of
three USCCB committees issued a statement saying: “America has the ability
to serve every person while making room for valid conscientious
objection.”
The
committees’ statement also said it hoped the court would continue to
“preserve the ability of people to live out their faith in daily life,
regardless of their occupation,” noting that artists “deserve to have
the freedom to express ideas — or to decline to create certain messages — in
accordance with their deeply held beliefs.”
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Follow Zimmermann on Twitter: @carolzim
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