Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission is a pending case before the Supreme Court of the United States on whether creative businesses can refuse certain services due to their First Amendment rights of free speech and free exercise of religion in light of public accommodation laws--in particular, by refusing to provide creative services, such as a custom wedding cake for same-sex marriage ceremonies, on the basis of one's religious beliefs. The Court took oral arguments on December 5, 2017, with a decision likely to be made by the end of the court's term.
Video Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission
Background
In 2012, same-sex couple Charlie Craig and David Mullins from Colorado made plans to be legally married in Massachusetts and return to Colorado to celebrate with their family and friends. At that time, Colorado did not recognize same-sex marriages, though since 2014, the state has allowed same-sex marriages, and the Supreme Court of the United States recognized same-sex marriages as a fundamental right in Obergefell v. Hodges 576 U.S. ___ (2015).
Craig and Mullins visited Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado in July 2012 to order a custom wedding cake for their return celebration. Masterpiece's owner Jack Phillips, who is Christian, declined their cake request, informing the couple that he did not create wedding cakes for same-sex marriages due to his Christian religious beliefs, although the couple could purchase other baked goods in the store. Craig and Mullins promptly left Masterpiece without discussing with Phillips any details of their wedding cake. The following day, Craig's mother, Deborah Munn, called Phillips, who advised her that Masterpiece did not make wedding cakes for same-sex weddings because of his religious beliefs and because Colorado did not recognize same-sex marriages.
While another bakery provided a cake to the couple, Craig and Mullins filed a complaint to the Colorado Civil Rights Commission under the state's public accommodations law, the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act, which prohibits businesses open to the public from discriminating against their customers on the basis of race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation. Colorado is one of twenty-one U.S. states that have anti-discrimination laws against sexual orientation. Craig and Mullins' complaint resulted in a lawsuit, Craig v. Masterpiece Cakeshop. The case was decided in favor of the plaintiffs; the cake shop was ordered not only to provide cakes to same-sex marriages, but to "change its company policies, provide 'comprehensive staff training' regarding public accommodations discrimination, and provide quarterly reports for the next two years regarding steps it has taken to come into compliance and whether it has turned away any prospective customers."
Masterpiece appealed the decision with the aid of Alliance Defending Freedom, and refused to comply with the State's orders, instead opting to remove themselves from the wedding cake business; Phillips claimed that this decision cost him 40% of his business. Alongside the Colorado Civil Rights Commission, the American Civil Liberties Union represented Craig and Mullins during the appeals. The State's decision was upheld by the Colorado Court of Appeals on appeal. In its decision, the Colorado Court of Appeals asserted that despite the artistic nature of creating a custom cake, the act of making the cake was part of the expected conduct of Phillips' business, and not an expression of free speech nor free exercise of religion. The Court of Appeals distinguished its decision in Craig from another case in which three bakeries refused to create a cake with the message "Homosexuality is a detestable sin. Leviticus 18:22", citing that in the latter, the bakeries had made other cakes for Christian customers and declined that order based on the offensive message rather than the customers' creed, whereas Masterpiece Cakeshop's refusal to provide Craig & Mullins with a wedding cake "was because of its opposition to same sex marriage which...is tantamount to discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation."
The Supreme Court of Colorado declined to hear an appeal.
Maps Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission
Supreme Court
Masterpiece Cakeshop petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court for certiorari (review), under the case name Masterpiece Cakeshop, Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, of the following question:
Whether applying Colorado's public accommodations law to compel Phillips to create expression that violates his sincerely held religious beliefs about marriage violates the Free Speech or Free Exercise Clauses of the First Amendment.
Both the Colorado Civil Rights Commission and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) urged the Supreme Court to reject the appeal, fearing that a Court decision in favor of the business would create a "gaping hole" in civil rights laws on the basis of religion. The final briefs at the certiorari stage were received in December 2016. The Court agreed to hear the case in the 2017 term and oral arguments were heard on December 5, 2017.
In further filings, Masterpiece requested that the Colorado anti-discrimination law be reviewed by the Supreme Court under strict scrutiny. He further identified that while the state's law is to assure that same-sex couples had access to the same services as heterosexual couples, the law goes too far in its enforcement, since Craig and Mullins were able to obtain a wedding cake from a different vendor in the state easily. Masterpiece further believed the anti-discrimination law can be used to selectively discriminate against religion, as the Commission has allowed bakers to refuse to provide cakes with anti-same-sex marriage messages on them, even though the Commission said these refusals were appropriate due to the offensiveness of the messages and not on the basis of religion. The State and the ACLU countered these points, stating the law was aimed only at conduct of a business, not their speech, and in cases like a wedding cake, "[no] reasonable observer would understand the Company's provision of a cake to a gay couple as an expression of its approval of the customer's marriage". They further argued that the cakeshop could provide catchall language to explain that any services they provide do not endorse any expressions of free speech associated with it, an allowance within the anti-discrimination law.
Around 100 legal briefs were filed by third parties, roughly equally split in supporting either side of the case. Among those supporting Phillips include the United States Department of Justice under the Republican Trump administration. While the Department asserts that anti-discrimination laws are necessary to prevent businesses that provide goods and services, these laws cannot be used to compel a business into expressing speech they do not agree with, nor used to provide goods and services with such expressions without the ability for the business to assert they do not agree with those expressions. The brief was criticized by several groups, including those that support LGBTQ rights, seeing the brief as a pattern of anti-LGBTQ actions by the current administration and fearing that a decision in favor of Masterpiece would enable such businesses to have a "license to discriminate".
Oral arguments for the plaintiffs were provided by Kristen Waggoner for the Alliance Defending Freedom, representing Phillips, and the Solicitor General of the United States Noel Francisco, presenting the United States' government case as amicus curiae in support of Masterpiece Cakeshop. The defendants' arguments were given by Colorado Solicitor General Frederick Yarger, on behalf of the Colorado Civil Rights Commission, and David D. Cole of the ACLU, on behalf of Craig and Mullins. Questions asked by the Justices attempted to determine where the bounds of a cake baker's rights and the rights of those soliciting his services would extend by considering several hypothetical situations involving the making of and selling custom cakes, including situations related to racial and gender-preference discrimination.
Experts believe the Supreme Court's opinions in the case will be divided, with the ultimate decision falling on the opinion of Justice Anthony Kennedy, who has historically been a swing vote in his term. In his past case history, he has been a supporter of an individual's same-sex rights, having written the majority opinion for Obergefell, and a corporation's freedom of speech in his majority opinion for Citizens United v. FEC 558 U.S. 310 (2010), and freedom of religion through his concurrence with the majority in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. 573 U.S. ___ (2014).
See also
- Klein v. Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries (2017) - contemporaneous case, currently in Oregon state courts, resulting from the denial to a same-sex couple of a wedding cake due to the bakery owners' religious beliefs
- Arlene's Flowers lawsuit (2017) - A Washington State Supreme Court decision that ruled that flower arrangements were not a form of protected speech.
References
External links
- SCOTUSblog case page
Source of article : Wikipedia
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