Supreme Court Sides With Baker Who Turned Away Gay Couple

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court sided with a Colorado baker Monday in a closely watched case pitting gay rights against claims of religious freedom.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the majority in the 7-2 decision, relied on narrow grounds, saying a state commission had violated the Constitution’s protection of religious freedom in ruling against the baker, Jack Phillips, who had refused to create a custom wedding cake for a gay couple.

“The neutral and respectful consideration to which Phillips was entitled was compromised here,” Kennedy wrote. “The Civil Rights Commission’s treatment of his case has some elements of a clear and impermissible hostility toward the sincere religious beliefs that motivated his objection.”

The Supreme Court’s decision, which turned on the commission’s asserted hostility to religion, strongly reaffirmed protections for gay rights and left open the possibility that other cases raising similar issues could be decided differently.

“The outcome of cases like this in other circumstances must await further elaboration in the courts,” Kennedy wrote, “all in the context of recognizing that these disputes must be resolved with tolerance, without undue disrespect to sincere religious beliefs, and without subjecting gay persons to indignities when they seek goods and services in an open market.”

Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Stephen Breyer, Samuel Alito, Elena Kagan and Neil Gorsuch joined the majority opinion. Justice Clarence Thomas voted with the majority but would have adopted broader reasons.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, dissented.

The case, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, No. 16-111, arose from a brief encounter in 2012, when David Mullins and Charlie Craig visited Phillips’ bakery, Masterpiece Cakeshop, in Lakewood, Colorado. The two men were going to be married in Massachusetts and they were looking for a wedding cake for a reception in Colorado.

Phillips turned them down, saying he would not use his talents to convey a message of support for same-sex marriage at odds with his religious faith. Mullins and Craig said they were humiliated by Phillips’ refusal to serve them, and they filed a complaint with Colorado’s civil rights commission, saying that Phillips had violated a state law barring discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Mullins and Craig won before the Colorado civil rights commission and in the state courts.

The Colorado Court of Appeals ruled that Phillips’ free speech rights had not been violated, noting that the couple had not discussed the cake’s design before Phillips turned them down. The court added that people seeing the cake would not understand Phillips to be making a statement and that he remained free to say what he liked about same-sex marriage in other settings.

Gay rights groups argued that same-sex couples are entitled to equal treatment from businesses open to the public. A ruling for Phillips, they said, would undermine the Supreme Court’s 2015 ruling guaranteeing a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, marking the unions of gay couples second-class marriages unworthy of legal protection.

Religious groups responded that the government should not force people to violate their principles in order to make a living. The Supreme Court has long recognized a First Amendment right not to be forced to speak, they said. In 1977, for instance, the court ruled that New Hampshire could not require people to display license plates bearing the state’s motto, “Live Free or Die.”

Though the case was mostly litigated on free speech grounds, Kennedy’s opinion barely discussed the issue. Instead, he focused on what he said were flaws in the proceedings before the Colorado Civil Rights Commission. Members of the commission, he wrote, had acted with “clear and impermissible hostility” to sincerely held religious beliefs.

One commissioner in particular, Kennedy wrote, had crossed the line in saying that “freedom of religion and religion has been used to justify all kinds of discrimination throughout history, whether it be slavery, whether it be the Holocaust.”

Kennedy wrote that “this sentiment is inappropriate for a commission charged with the solemn responsibility of fair and neutral enforcement of Colorado’s anti-discrimination law.”

In dissent, Ginsburg said that a few stray remarks were not enough to justify a ruling in Phillips’ favor.

“What prejudice infected the determinations of the adjudicators in the case before and after the commission?” Ginsburg asked. “The court does not say.” But Ginsburg said “there is much in the court’s opinion with which I agree,” quoting several passages reaffirming gay-rights protections.

“Colorado law,” Kennedy wrote in one, “can protect gay persons, just as it can protect other classes of individuals, in acquiring whatever products and services they choose on the same terms and conditions as are offered to other members of the public.”

Alliance Defending Freedom, which represented Phillips, said the ruling was a victory for religious liberty.

“Government hostility toward people of faith has no place in our society, yet the state of Colorado was openly antagonistic toward Jack’s religious beliefs about marriage,” said Kristen Waggoner, a lawyer with the group. “The court was right to condemn that. Tolerance and respect for good-faith differences of opinion are essential in a society like ours.”

The American Civil Liberties Union, which represented Mullins and Craig, said it welcomed the parts of the majority opinion that reaffirmed legal protections for gay men and lesbians.

“The court reversed the Masterpiece Cakeshop decision based on concerns unique to the case but reaffirmed its long-standing rule that states can prevent the harms of discrimination in the marketplace, including against LGBT people,” said Louise Melling, the group’s deputy legal director.