JUSTICES HAD THEIR CAKE, ATE IT TOO | Colorado Baker Wins | SCOTUS Throws Out Case Of Immigrant Teen’s Abortion
June 4, 2018
HAPPY CAKE DAY
|At long last, we got ourselves a decision from SCOTUS on the big cake dispute. The justices decided to have their cake and eat it too when they narrowly ruled in favor of the Colorado baker and side-stepped the bigger question on the line between discrimination and religious objection. JACK PHILLIPS, who refused to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple. JUSTICE ANTHONY KENNEDYwrote for the majority, and only JUSTICES RUTH BADER GINSBURG and SONIA SOTOMAYOR dissented. The majority found that the Colorado Civil Rights Commission violated its obligation to religious neutrality when it heard the case. Lawyers for Phillips had argued that he didn’t refuse to serve the couple entirely, he just refused to make them a custom cake. However, in Justice Ginsburg’s dissent, she argued that it wasn’t about the cake. (Is it ever really just about the cake?) She wrote, “The fact that Phillips might sell other cakes and cookies to gay and lesbian customers was irrelevant to the issue Craig and Mullins’ case presented. What matters is that Phillips would not provide a good or service to a same-sex couple that he would provide to a heterosexual couple.”
EAT YOUR FEELINGS
|In case you’re worried about the outcome of the Masterpiece Cakeshop case, German Lopez with Vox says it’s time to chill. “If you need to know anything about the Supreme Court’s ruling in favor of the baker who refused to make a same-sex wedding cake, it’s this: It could have been much worse.” In other words, SCOTUS punted on the broader issues involved in the case and focused only on the specific circumstances of the baker’s arguments.
BEEN THERE DONE THAT
|The Supreme Court threw out a lower court ruling this morning that allowed a pregnant illegal immigrant minor held in federal immigration custody to get an abortion last year. Justices decided today the dispute became moot once she got her abortion. The action from the court gives a legal victory to the Trump administration which had objected to the 17-year-old getting the procedure. Although the deed is done and the young woman was allowed to get the procedure, the decision from SCOTUS eliminated a precedent at the federal appeals court level that could have applied in similar circumstances in which detained minors sought abortions.
ALL ROADS LEAD TO SCOTUS
|Philip Bump argues in The Washington Post that the Trump presidency may hinge on a Supreme Court decision. He points to three issues that seem likely the end up before the high court including a potential self-pardon from POTUS, a rejection of the special counsel’s authority, and a rejection of a subpoena from the special counsel.
ONLY THE BEGINNING
|This morning we got a taste for what the rest of this month holds for Supreme Court news — and boy are we ready for more. Camila Domonoske with NPR notes which cases are still awaiting rulings from the justices, and they’re almost all blockbusters.
SCOTUS VIEWS
It's Not About The Cake. It's About Religious Hostility.
Bloomberg“What this suggests is that Kennedy was really trying hard to find a way to resolve the case without declaring a broad legal principle – and used the comments to do it. The intriguing consequence of this decision is that it doesn’t really provide definitive guidance even for future wedding-cake cases, much less other conflicts between religious conscience and gay rights.”
Gay Americans Have Little To Fear From The Supreme Court's Compromise In Masterpiece Cakeshop
Slate“Everybody who hoped this decision would definitively settle the ostensible clash between LGBTQ rights and religious freedom. In the end, Masterpiece Cakeshop barely resolves anything and doesn’t even touch the free-speech claim at the center of the case. Instead, it punts that question, leaving lower courts (and American society) to continue fighting about how, exactly, Justice Anthony Kennedy should feel about it. A great wedding cake might leave you wanting more, but Masterpiece Cakeshop just leaves you craving something you can actually sink your teeth into.”
After Masterpiece, It's Time To Change The Constitution
The New York Times“In other words, while Masterpiece is a loss for L.G.B.T.Q. people, the question of how to balance religious freedom with the rights of queer people remains unresolved, and will most likely continue to be explored and debated in the future, and by the Supreme Court not least. And this, more than the case itself, is the greater loss for L.G.B.T.Q. people. We lose when our rights are considered debatable. Even if the Supreme Court had ruled unanimously against the baker, in fact, L.G.B.T.Q. Americans would still be considered second-class citizens in many aspects of civic life.”