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The Justice Department goes out of its way to side against a gay couple
Source: Washington Post
The Justice Department goes out of its way to side against a gay couple
By Editorial Board September 13 at 7:32 PM
SHOULD A Colorado baker have the right to turn away a gay couple seeking a custom wedding cake if he disapproves of their upcoming marriage? According to the Justice Department, the answer is yes.
The Supreme Court will soon hear arguments over the conduct of this unwilling baker in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission. Though the federal government isn’t a party to the case, the Justice Department has made a point of weighing in on the side of Jack Phillips, the “cake artist” whose religious opposition to same-sex marriage led him to refuse to design a cake for a gay couple. (The pair eventually obtained a rainbow-layered cake.)
The Justice Department’s legal brief has — rightly — faced criticism from civil rights groups appalled by the government’s argument that Mr. Phillips’s religious beliefs grant him a constitutional right to discriminate against gay customers, despite a Colorado public-accommodations law prohibiting unequal treatment on the basis of sexual orientation. Indeed, the brief is a dispiriting signal of Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s priorities. The government went out of its way to side with Mr. Phillips, but it has been quiet on any number of other significant cases before the Supreme Court this term.
In one sense, the Justice Department has clarified the stakes. The brief frames the case as a matter of free expression rather than free exercise of Mr. Phillips’s religious beliefs. That’s because Masterpiece Cakeshop isn’t really a religious-freedom case at all — though Mr. Phillips’s attorneys do point to their client’s constitutional rights on that front. Because Colorado lacks legislation raising the standard for state infringement on religious belief — unlike many states and the federal government — Mr. Phillips is left with what’s likely a losing argument.
-snip-
By Editorial Board September 13 at 7:32 PM
SHOULD A Colorado baker have the right to turn away a gay couple seeking a custom wedding cake if he disapproves of their upcoming marriage? According to the Justice Department, the answer is yes.
The Supreme Court will soon hear arguments over the conduct of this unwilling baker in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission. Though the federal government isn’t a party to the case, the Justice Department has made a point of weighing in on the side of Jack Phillips, the “cake artist” whose religious opposition to same-sex marriage led him to refuse to design a cake for a gay couple. (The pair eventually obtained a rainbow-layered cake.)
The Justice Department’s legal brief has — rightly — faced criticism from civil rights groups appalled by the government’s argument that Mr. Phillips’s religious beliefs grant him a constitutional right to discriminate against gay customers, despite a Colorado public-accommodations law prohibiting unequal treatment on the basis of sexual orientation. Indeed, the brief is a dispiriting signal of Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s priorities. The government went out of its way to side with Mr. Phillips, but it has been quiet on any number of other significant cases before the Supreme Court this term.
In one sense, the Justice Department has clarified the stakes. The brief frames the case as a matter of free expression rather than free exercise of Mr. Phillips’s religious beliefs. That’s because Masterpiece Cakeshop isn’t really a religious-freedom case at all — though Mr. Phillips’s attorneys do point to their client’s constitutional rights on that front. Because Colorado lacks legislation raising the standard for state infringement on religious belief — unlike many states and the federal government — Mr. Phillips is left with what’s likely a losing argument.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-justice-department-goes-out-of-its-way-to-side-against-a-gay-couple/2017/09/13/1055b664-9808-11e7-87fc-c3f7ee4035c9_story.html
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