Cakegate to be decided by supremes

There's a fundamental right to be exempt from any law you choose, if you claim you have a religious belief?

No. That's why we're having this trial - to determine where the boundaries are. And to illustrate just how absurd the notion is that religious belief trumps everything else, no one in the USA can just go around stoning people just because they claim their holy texts require it if someone breaks the sabbath, practices witchcraft, repeatedly rebels against their parents, etc.

 

Too silly to give a shyte about either way.

 

Except that would be compelled speech, which isn't likely to fly.

 

Here is a link to the transcript of the oral arguments in Masterpiece Cakeshop vs. Colorado Civil Rights Commission.

https://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcripts/2017/16-111_f314.pdf

 

Except that this baker does. He doesn't discriminate against people, only specific services.

 

This, exactly.

It's both good and awful (as reality always is) that many do just that, regardless of any laws. The reason we don't hear about these situations is that those 'refused' are not members of groups which are politically active.

 

Wanna bet? Canada is already there.

Eventually, NK won't have to hate us.

 

T shirt screen printers frequently turn down jobs due to language or themes considered too risque. Again, we don't hear about this because the people told 'no, sorry we can't take that job' don't get twisted about it.

 

And what if it is their religious beliefs? We have a lot of martyrs to attest to that, not only in the first centuries of Christianity, when they tried to civilize the world and establish the humane laws we now have, but also in the Soviet Union... which as you should know, was the first 'paradise' of the liberal ideologues.

 

I understand

He does not privide wedding cakes for homosexuals

 

It seems to me that there's a growing, willful misunderstanding of how fundamental rights actually work in the real world. They are neither absolute, nor is there any requirement that you be furnished with the venue or means to exercise them.

The right to free speech is a protection against the government trying to squelch it, not a protection from having to hear the speech of other people whose views one might find disagreeable.

If you walk into a private business and begin preaching loudly that people need to repent or face God's wrath, you are not exercising a fundamental right. The owner has no obligation to provide you his space as the venue for that speech, and if he requires you to leave because you're interfering with his ability to conduct business by scaring off his patrons, neither is that a violation of your fundamental right to free exercise of religion. His place of business is not your church.

On the other hand, we have federal, state, and local laws that aim to curb undue discrimination and its detrimental effects on society, and the courts have agreed that doing so is a compelling interest of government.

So the questions the Court will need to address have to do with the level of scrutiny applied. Is the law narrowly tailored, or overly broad in pursuit of its goals? Are the means of achieving the law's goals the least restrictive available? Or did the commission apply the law in a way that is unduly burdensome?

The fact that something is considered a fundamental right, does not mean there can be no burdens whatsoever placed upon its exercise. But those burdens have to forward a compelling interest, be narrowly tailored, and be the list restrictive means of achieving the interest.

 

I do not think you can show that the couple in question had the goal of exterminating the baker, or his beliefs. Requesting a wedding cake from someone in the business of making wedding cakes forwards neither of those aims.

As for the "Soviet Union" "liberal ideologues" schtick, don't even try this kind of thing with me. Anti-discrimination laws have nothing whatsoever to do with the kind of ridiculous comparison you're trying to draw, or the attempt to personally troll me with the 'liberal' label.

 

I know very few people who claim the contrary.

I do claim that there is a difference between a right created by a "progressive" state legislature and a right explicitly guaranteed by the federal constitution. And a legislative creation must yield to the constitution, which is not the same as "there are no exceptions to constitutional rights."

We don't get to rank, measure, or prioritize such rights when they conflict, as they do here. That's the Supreme Court's job. Accordingly, I am willing to accept the Supreme Court's opinion as the last word on Cakegate, at least as it relates to these two litigants, regardless of the ruling.

 

We are not the same country today because of public accommodation laws. There is nothing to say we won't regress to a similar situation without them.

 

I am changing my prediction slightly: Masterpiece Cake Shop still wins, but by 6-3, not 7-2. Dissenters will be Ginsburg, Sotomayor, and Breyer.

 

As I've already brought forth, a hierarchy of rights isn't what's at question here. The question is whether the baker's perception of his rights and their scope aligns with what the the law actually requires. Arguing the abstract concept that constitutional rights trump statutory rights doesn't address this at all.

But isn't that exactly what you're trying to do by saying that constitutional rights trump statutory rights?

It's not as if we have much choice otherwise. But I think it mischaracterizes the process the Court will use to say that it involves "ranking, measuring, or prioritizing" rights. The question is whether there's an undue burdening of the baker's rights in the way the government uses the law to achieve its compelling interest.

 

When the public accomidation law is being abused to mandate Christian-made wedding cakes for homosexuals its time for the law to go

 

"When the public accommodation law is being abused..." < - it's merely your opinion that it's being abused. Framing an opinion as if it were fact does not make it so.

A wedding cake is a wedding cake, regardless of who makes it, or for whom it is made.

 

He didn't turn down the groom's elderly hetero parents. He turned down the couple.

 

Yes its my opinion

I never said otherwise

 

Sotomayor made an interesting observation, that the cake is the medium of expression, not the expression itself. This is illustrated by the example of the man who bought an apology cake for his wife; the apology being his expression (not the baker's), and the cake being the medium by which the husband expressed that apology.

I doubt this will be persuasive in the final outcome, though.

 

I'm giving my opinion. I don't sit on the Supreme Court, so I don't decide.

 

As you've already opined, you mean. I opine differently.

The Supreme Court may rule in favor of the baker without saying that freedom of expression and/or free exercise of religion are fundamental (though they clearly are) or that they trump a statutory right created by the State of Colorado (though they clearly do). They may also rule for the Colorado Civil Rights Commission by saying that baking a wedding cake is not protected expression. But the State of Colorado could repeal its anti-discrimination act tomorrow -- tonight, really -- and gay couples would have no recourse anywhere (for discrimination occurring after repeal). But not even the U.S. Supreme Court can rescind the baker's rights under the First Amendment. They are therefore superior to the state's anti-discrimination laws.

I don't at all say that the Supreme Court will want or need to say any of this (because it's blindingly obvious). My own guess is that they will avoid the whole constitutional issue either by 1) finding that the Commission's order is void because, as applied in this particular case, it was arbitrary and capricious, in which case Masterpiece wins. Or, 2) they may find that Masterpiece loses because his First Amendment rights aren't even implicated: he is not, they may conclude, being compelled to personally or professionally embrace the message on the cake.

The factual problem for me is that the customers didn't walk in and say "Please bake us a vanilla cake with white icing, etc." Nor did they walk in with a picture of a cake they wanted. Instead, they asked him not to just bake the cake but also to design it.

Anyway, the following is from the Colorado Court of Appeals' ruling, which I hope will shush those claiming that Masterpiece does not serve gays:

"This case juxtaposes the rights of complainants, Charlie Craig and David Mullins, under Colorado’s public accommodations law to obtain a wedding cake to celebrate their same-sex marriage against the rights of respondents, Masterpiece Cakeshop, Inc., and its owner, Jack C. Phillips, who contend that requiring them to provide such a wedding cake violates their constitutional rights to freedom of speech and the free exercise of religion.

... Craig and Mullins visited Masterpiece, a bakery in Lakewood, Colorado, and requested that Phillips design and create a cake to celebrate their same-sex wedding. Phillips declined, telling them that he does not create wedding cakes for same-sex weddings because of his religious beliefs, but advising Craig and Mullins that he would be happy to make and sell them any other baked goods. "

 

I hope and believe you are wrong. The baker offered to sell them any of his inventory but refused to make art they demanded. The art argument may win this for the baker

 

The baker would have refused to make a same sex marriage wedding cake for two heterosexuals. Hes not excluding people. He doesnt oppose same sex marriage because those who desire it are probably gay.