Supreme Court gives victory to cake baker

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court gave a boost to advocates of religious freedom on Monday, ruling that a Colorado baker cannot be forced to make a cake for a same-sex wedding, in a case that involved marriage equality and protection from discrimination.

But the opinion was a narrow one, applying to the specific facts of this case only. It gave no hint as to how the court might decide future cases involving florists, bakers, photographers and other business owners who have cited religious and free-speech objections when refusing to serve gay and lesbian customers in the wake of the Supreme Court's 2015 same-sex marriage decision.

In the 7-2 decision, the court said legal proceedings in Colorado had shown a hostility to the baker's religious views. Monday's ruling was written by Justice Anthony Kennedy, who also wrote the Supreme Court's same-sex marriage decision.

"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," Kennedy wrote.

But the ruling, which came during Pride Month, gave little guidance to the lower courts about how to balance those competing interests.

The decision was a victory for Jack Phillips of Masterpiece Cake in Denver, who has said that his cakes are works of art and that requiring him to bake them for same-sex weddings would force him to express a view that violated his religious beliefs. He runs his business guided by religious principles, closing on Sunday and refusing to make cakes containing alcohol or celebrating Halloween.

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The ACLU said in a statement Monday, "The Supreme Court today reaffirmed the core principle that businesses open to the public must be open to all. ... The court did not accept arguments that would have turned back the clock on equality by making our basic civil rights protections unenforceable, but reversed this case based on concerns specific to the facts here."

The Supreme Court's decision means that business owners cannot be successfully sued for refusing on religious grounds to provide services to same-sex couples, even in the 21 states with human rights laws similar to Colorado's ban on discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.

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Reading the notes on SCOTUSblog, it seems that the ruling is fairly narrow to this particular case and is based more on the belief that the baker didn't receive a fair trial rather than stating religious beliefs generally take precedence over non-discriminatory state laws.