14 minutes ago, ToastJenkins said:

Perhaps after the cake incident/case they felt the need to settle the matter?

But there was nothing to settle because no harm was demonstrated. 

There is no line of gay couples lining up to have a wedding site created by someone hostile to their union. 

I'm personally at the point where if it can be demonstrated that market alternatives exist, that it should be part of the legal standard. Meaning that the gay couple would need to demonstrate that no comparable market alternative exists in order to demonstrate harm. 

There might be some concern about "separate but equal" legal consequences to that thinking that I can't predict, but it seems reasonable for 2023. The progress made on acceptance of homosexuality broadly speaking in the last 20 years makes me think some of these protections might not be needed.

Though of course there's plenty of people who try to disabuse me of my optimism about social progress, but I digress. Losing the thread here.

I don't think the SC exists to cherry pick made up cases about hypothetical scenarios in order to settle matters it perceives as having constitutional ambiguity. Just accepting this case, especially if they knew it was speculative harm not actual demonstrable harm, is going to cause more legal issues than it solves.

If there wasn't even any attempt to demonstrate actual harm (not snowflake crap) then accepting the case was a GIANT mistake as it sets a terrible terrible precedent.

@Dave Moss approves with the smiley so I know I have another great post

Another argument against this that rings true to me: this case was basically brought against a hypothetical gay couple that doesn't exist. A gay couple that had no legal representation, and was not able to make any legal argument to argue the harm this discrimination would visit upon them.

You can still believe legally that you'd come down on the side of this web developer, but legally you had a plaintiff arguing against a hypothetical scenario that didn't happen, with no argument made for the harm that a gay couple would experience. 

These cases come down to making a decision when the rights of multiple parties are in tension. Does the right of a business owner to accept and decline clients based on their moral belief systems outweigh the right of a consumer to not be discriminated against on the basis of sexual orientation? I don't know, and I also don't know if in a case where the consumer has no opportunity to argue that the call can or should be made.

52 minutes ago, ToastJenkins said:

Perhaps after the cake incident/case they felt the need to settle the matter?

That's what's strange though, the Christian baker case was more of a borderline scenario. This one is super cut and dry, especially in light of existing precedent like the cake case.

2 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

Super bad precedent if all it takes is someone saying they are concerned that they might feel bad about something in the future.  We can't be allowing snowflakes to take bad feelings into the courts and expect some ruling based on a feeling that something might make them feel uncomfortable at some point in time.

But didn’t the results of the district court and tenth circuit of appeals prove her point?  The Tenth circuit observed that if she intends to create wedding websites, then Colorado intended to compel her to create websites for all weddings, including weddings she doesn’t agree with.

the state said if she is to sell a product to some, she must sell the product to all.  IMO this is flawed thinking, as she’s not selling some generic product.  She isn’t making apple pies and then saying "I’m only going to sell these apple pies to straight people”

5 hours ago, we_gotta_believe said:

So she's alleging harm presumably because she's a self-employed freelance web designer looking to expand to doing weddings in addition to whatever she does now? In other words, does she own her own business and have actual clients now? She's apparently already lied about this gay couple and the guy she listed already confirmed he never requested her services and has no idea why she listed him. 

Not sure what you mean when you say she "lied about this gay couple”.  I skimmed through the case text, and see no mention of a gay couple.  Admittedly I read through it quickly and maybe missed something, but if someone can point that to me it would be appreciated.

she filed an injunction against the state, and it was denied. She appealed, and the lower court’s decision was affirmed, and the tenth circuit observed that the state intends to compel her to create wedding websites for all weddings if she is to enter into that business space. 
So this doesn’t seem like much of a hypothetical? She already got her answer from the state that once she enters the wedding website space, that she must provide her services even if it’s for a wedding she disagrees with.

1 hour ago, Phillyterp85 said:

But didn’t the results of the district court and tenth circuit of appeals prove her point?  The Tenth circuit observed that if she intends to create wedding websites, then Colorado intended to compel her to create websites for all weddings, including weddings she doesn’t agree with.

the state said if she is to sell a product to some, she must sell the product to all.  IMO this is flawed thinking, as she’s not selling some generic product.  She isn’t making apple pies and then saying "I’m only going to sell these apple pies to straight people”

What was the original case? 

36 minutes ago, DrPhilly said:

What was the original case? 

This was the District Court case

https://casetext.com/case/303-creative-llc-v-elenis-1

 

This was the Tenth Circuit case

https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/ca10/19-1413/19-1413-2021-07-26.html

3 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

@Dave Moss approves with the smiley so I know I have another great post

The fakest intellectual around

5 hours ago, we_gotta_believe said:

That's what's strange though, the Christian baker case was more of a borderline scenario. This one is super cut and dry, especially in light of existing precedent like the cake case.

I agree its a strange case to hear

5 hours ago, we_gotta_believe said:

That's what's strange though, the Christian baker case was more of a borderline scenario. This one is super cut and dry, especially in light of existing precedent like the cake case.

The Baker did not suffer any damages. Damages are necessary for a case to have standing. This case should never have been heard. 

Among the essential elements of what the Court considers a case or controversy is an injured plaintiff.  The requirement that a plaintiff show that he or she has suffered "injury in fact" is a key requirement of the Court's doctrine of standing.

7 hours ago, Phillyterp85 said:

Not sure what you mean when you say she "lied about this gay couple”.  I skimmed through the case text, and see no mention of a gay couple.  Admittedly I read through it quickly and maybe missed something, but if someone can point that to me it would be appreciated.

she filed an injunction against the state, and it was denied. She appealed, and the lower court’s decision was affirmed, and the tenth circuit observed that the state intends to compel her to create wedding websites for all weddings if she is to enter into that business space. 
So this doesn’t seem like much of a hypothetical? She already got her answer from the state that once she enters the wedding website space, that she must provide her services even if it’s for a wedding she disagrees with.

A Colorado web designer who the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Friday could refuse to make wedding websites for gay couples cited a request from a man who says he never asked to work with her.

...

The request in dispute, from a person identified as "Stewart," wasn't the basis for the federal lawsuit filed preemptively seven years ago by web designer Lorie Smith, before she started making wedding websites. But as the case advanced, it was referenced by her attorneys when lawyers for the state of Colorado pressed Smith on whether she had sufficient grounds to sue.

Smith named Stewart — and included a website service request from him, listing his phone number and email address in 2017 court documents. But Stewart told The Associated Press he never submitted the request and didn't know his name was invoked in the lawsuit until he was contacted this week by a reporter from The New Republic, which first reported his denial.

...

"I was incredibly surprised given the fact that I've been happily married to a woman for the last 15 years," said Stewart, who declined to give his last name for fear of harassment and threats. His contact information, but not his last name, were listed in court documents

https://www.npr.org/2023/07/01/1185632827/web-designer-supreme-court-gay-couples

@Phillyterp85 is correct. She was a web designer who wanted to start making websites for weddings, but current Colorado law would have forced her to make websites for gay weddings. She sought a ruling invalidating that law and granting an injunction. The irreparable harm was that without the injunction, she couldn’t enter the wedding website market. There was no need for any customer to ask her for a website, as she was contesting the law that would have compelled her to do so. 
 

The story above wasn’t the basis for her case. Obviously, lying about it is still a crappy move. 

15 hours ago, Phillyterp85 said:

This was the District Court case

https://casetext.com/case/303-creative-llc-v-elenis-1

 

This was the Tenth Circuit case

https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/ca10/19-1413/19-1413-2021-07-26.html

Ok, looking at the original court case, it seems reasonable to take this one.  Funny thing, the Colorado law is quite narrow and only attempted to protect sexual orientation.  So basically, freedom of religion/speech trumps potential discrimination due to sexual orientation.  That's where we are with this one.  Now we will get to see a ton of new similar attempts to extend the boundaries.

1 hour ago, DrPhilly said:

Ok, looking at the original court case, it seems reasonable to take this one.  Funny thing, the Colorado law is quite narrow and only attempted to product sexual orientation.  So basically, freedom of religion/speech trumps potential discrimination due to sexual orientation.  That's where we are with this one.  Now we will get to see a ton of new similar attempts to extend the boundaries.

Once again, the ruling has nothing to do with freedom of religion. This is the same thing people kept getting confused about in the cake case.

It's an issue of compelled speech. If the web designer was black, and some racist white trumpbots like kkkz asked her to design a super racist website depicting graphic lynchings, the gross disfigurement of bodies like Emmett Till, or even things unimaginably worse, should she be compelled by law to do it? What about if she were a rape or sexual abuse victim as a child and someone asked her to design a website glorifying rape or incest? No, of course she shouldn't be compelled to depict art that she doesn't agree with. None of the above has anything to do with religion. And in this scenario, there's really no case to be made by the state of Colorado that web design is a public accommodation, which is the basis of civil rights era anti-discrimination laws.

And no, this didn't extend any boundaries. Existing precedent in Colorado was the cake case which already set a further boundary because a bakery actually did fall within the definition of a public accommodation but the baker satisfied the legal requirement by offering the gay couple an undecorated cake. In other words, he was careful to point out that he wasn't denying them food, he was denying them art.

 

Quote

 

Ms. Smith describes herself as a Christian and states that her religious beliefs are central to her identity. She believes that she must use her talents in a manner that glorifies God and that she must use her creative talents in operating 303 in a way that she believes will honor and please him. Consistent with those beliefs, Ms. Smith desire to limit the scope of her services. Although she is willing to work with all people regardless of their race, religion, gender, and sexual orientation, she "will decline any request to design, create, or promote content that: contradicts biblical truth; demeans or disparages others; promotes sexual immorality; supports the destruction of unborn children; incites violence; or promotes any conception of marriage other than marriage between one man and one woman." This restriction precludes provision of wedding website services for same-sex couples.

Ms. Smith has prepared a proposed statement ("the Statement") that she intends to post on 303's website to explain 303's policies: It reads:

 

I love weddings.

Each wedding is a story in itself, the story of a couple and their special love for each other.

I have the privilege of telling the story of your love and commitment by designing a stunning website that promotes your special day and communicates a unique story about your wedding - from the tale of the engagement, to the excitement of the wedding day, to the beautiful life you are building together.

I firmly believe that God is calling me to this work. Why? I am personally convicted that He wants me - during these uncertain times for those who believe in biblical marriage - to shine His light

and not stay silent. He is calling me to stand up for my faith, to explain His true story about marriage, and to use the talents and business He gave me to publicly proclaim and celebrate His design for marriage as a life-long union between one man and one woman.

These same religious convictions that motivate me also prevent me from creating websites promoting and celebrating ideas or messages that violate my beliefs. So I will not be able to create websites for same-sex marriages or any other marriage that is not between one man and one woman. Doing that would compromise my Christian witness and tell a story about marriage that contradicts God's true story of marriage-the very story He is calling me to promote.

For purposes of this ruling, the Court need only evaluate Ms. Smith's summary judgment motion. That motion was filed prior to the Court's dismissal of any Accommodation Clause challenge, making it somewhat difficult to extract those remaining arguments that remain pertinent to the Communication Clause itself. It appears to the Court that Ms. Smith alleges that: (i) the CCRC's anticipated application of the Communication Clause to her Statement violates the Equal Protection clause of the 14^th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution because the CCRC does not prosecute similarly-situated businesses expressing different religious beliefs; (ii) the Communication Clause violates the Substantive Due Process clause, in that it is vague and overbroad; (iii) the Communication Clause violates an otherwise unspecified constitutional right to "personal autonomy"; (iv) the Communication clause violates Ms. Smith's free speech rights in various ways, in violation of the First Amendment; and (iv) the Communication Clause constitutes a substantial burden on Ms. Smith's free exercise of religion, as guaranteed by the First Amendment, and does not survive strict scrutiny.

 

 

 

In case any of you don't have time to go actually read the initial case, here is the main chunk.  Fully focused on free speech and its cousin freedom of religion with both covered together in the first amendment.

34 minutes ago, DrPhilly said:

 

 

 

In case any of you don't have time to go actually read the initial case, here is the main chunk.  Fully focused on free speech and its cousin freedom of religion with both covered together in the first amendment.

Smith appealed to the Supreme Court, which, in February 2022, agreed to hear her claim, limited to the issue of free speech, not freedom of religion. The question for the nine justices to decide will be "whether applying a public-accommodation law to compel an artist to speak or stay silent violates the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment.”

https://buffalonews.com/news/national/govt-and-politics/supreme-court-to-revisit-lgbt-rights-this-time-with-a-wedding-website-designer-not-a/article_760207eb-d5fc-5c1e-affa-64d3da524449.html

On Monday, the Supreme Court will be hearing what I consider to be the most important case of this term: 303 Creative v. Elenis. Unless you’re a legal geek like me, you probably haven’t heard of this case. But if you’re concerned about threats to religious liberty from the LGBT front, then this is one you’ll definitely want to watch.

The facts of this case shouldn’t be surprising if you’ve been following Supreme Court cases like these over the last 10 years. Lorie Smith is a Christian creative professional in Colorado who designs custom websites for couples to celebrate their weddings. (Confession: I didn’t even know this was a thing until my wife introduced me to The Knot when we were engaged. If you’re a guy and you’re getting married, just let her do the planning; what you don’t know can hurt you. But I digress.)

In what might come as a surprise to many, the central issue here is not freedom of religion but freedom of speech. That may seem counterintuitive to many folks whose minds have not been warped by years of lawyering. (Seriously…y’all are the normal ones, not us.) So if that strategy doesn’t make sense, let me explain.

In 1990, the U.S. Supreme Court held that when a law that doesn’t necessarily target religion happens to infringe on religious exercise, the Free Exercise Clause generally does not protect freedom of religion. That would have come as a shock to James Madison, the primary Framer of the First Amendment, as I explained in last week’s op-ed. When religious freedom wins in court nowadays, it’s usually because the government was (1) showing explicit hostility towards religion (like calling Christians NSDAPs) or (2) applying the law unequally (like when Home Depot can stay open during a pandemic but churches can’t).

But while the Free Exercise Clause has been gutted in recent years, the Free Speech Clause has enjoyed robust protection. One of the core tenets is that the government may not prohibit somebody from speaking just because it does not like his or her viewpoint. It has also held that the freedom of speech includes the right not to speak, especially when you’re being forced to speak a message with which you strongly disagree. Robustly protecting freedom of speech in these ways has been one of the few things on which conservatives and old-school liberals have been able to agree. As far as I can tell, all the Court’s conservatives agree on this point.

https://1819news.com/news/item/matt-clark-keep-your-eye-on-303-creative-v-elenis

13 hours ago, jsdarkstar said:

The Baker did not suffer any damages. Damages are necessary for a case to have standing. This case should never have been heard. 

Among the essential elements of what the Court considers a case or controversy is an injured plaintiff.  The requirement that a plaintiff show that he or she has suffered "injury in fact" is a key requirement of the Court's doctrine of standing.

Forced labor is damages, captain cut n paste

13 minutes ago, we_gotta_believe said:

Smith appealed to the Supreme Court, which, in February 2022, agreed to hear her claim, limited to the issue of free speech, not freedom of religion. The question for the nine justices to decide will be "whether applying a public-accommodation law to compel an artist to speak or stay silent violates the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment.”

https://buffalonews.com/news/national/govt-and-politics/supreme-court-to-revisit-lgbt-rights-this-time-with-a-wedding-website-designer-not-a/article_760207eb-d5fc-5c1e-affa-64d3da524449.html

Ok thats makes a little more sense at least 

though im skeptical of web design as "art”

6 hours ago, ToastJenkins said:

Ok thats makes a little more sense at least 

though im skeptical of web design as "art”

Really? I'd say it qualifies as art more than baking a cake would. The latter involves food which at least has historical precedent in regards to the definition of a public accommodation.

Ironically, the same baker is apparently back in court again claiming that a transgender woman asking him to bake a pink cake with blue frosting is expressing a message he doesn't agree with. He'll probably win again but the dude is clearly just a hateful POS. But being a hateful POS isn't necessarily against the law if you have good lawyers coaching you on how to properly toe the line.

1 hour ago, we_gotta_believe said:

Once again, the ruling has nothing to do with freedom of religion. This is the same thing people kept getting confused about in the cake case.

It's an issue of compelled speech. If the web designer was black, and some racist white trumpbots like kkkz asked her to design a super racist website depicting graphic lynchings, the gross disfigurement of bodies like Emmett Till, or even things unimaginably worse, should she be compelled by law to do it? What about if she were a rape or sexual abuse victim as a child and someone asked her to design a website glorifying rape or incest? No, of course she shouldn't be compelled to depict art that she doesn't agree with. None of the above has anything to do with religion. And in this scenario, there's really no case to be made by the state of Colorado that web design is a public accommodation, which is the basis of civil rights era anti-discrimination laws.

And no, this didn't extend any boundaries. Existing precedent in Colorado was the cake case which already set a further boundary because a bakery actually did fall within the definition of a public accommodation but the baker satisfied the legal requirement by offering the gay couple an undecorated cake. In other words, he was careful to point out that he wasn't denying them food, he was denying them art.

Exactly.   This isn't someone making apple pies, and then saying "I'm only going to sell apple pies to straight people.  I will not sell an apple pie to someone who is gay"  That would be in violation of the law.  This is a compelled speech issue.  

No different than if the web designer was gay, and the Westboro Baptist Church came to her and said "we want you to design a website for the anti-gay messages we want to promote and make us a bunch of t-shirts for our upcoming protest at a funeral".  I'm glad I live in a country where the government wouldn't be allowed to compel a gay web designer to create an anti-gay website and create t-shirts with anti-gay messages on them.

 

29 minutes ago, Phillyterp85 said:

Exactly.   This isn't someone making apple pies, and then saying "I'm only going to sell apple pies to straight people.  I will not sell an apple pie to someone who is gay"  That would be in violation of the law.  This is a compelled speech issue.  

No different than if the web designer was gay, and the Westboro Baptist Church came to her and said "we want you to design a website for the anti-gay messages we want to promote and make us a bunch of t-shirts for our upcoming protest at a funeral".  I'm glad I live in a country where the government wouldn't be allowed to compel a gay web designer to create an anti-gay website and create t-shirts with anti-gay messages on them.

 

So if the couple is black instead of gay do you think a website designer should have the right to say I won’t design your website because you’re black?  

27 minutes ago, Dave Moss said:

So if the couple is black instead of gay do you think a website designer should have the right to say I won’t design your website because you’re black?  

She didn’t say she wouldn’t design a website for them because they were gay.  She said she wouldn’t create a website for a gay wedding.  This isn’t a case of refusing service because of WHO the client is.  This is a case of refusing service because of WHAT the client wants her to say.

If a white person came to a black web designer and said "hey I’d like to hire you to make a website for me.  The site is going to be called "whites are superior.com” and for my website I’m going to post a bunch of figures to illustrate my point that I think white people are better than black people”.  Do you think this website designer should be compelled to make this website?

edit: sorry I think I misunderstood your post.  You’re asking would the designer have the right to refuse to make a wedding website for a black straight couple? My initial thought is that the answer would still be the same.  I’m very leery about giving the government the power to compel speech.