For conservatives yearning for a non-Trumpian example of how to stand up to bullies, look to Colorado.
Jack Phillips, the most persecuted baker in America, is again challenging those who want to force him to violate his religious beliefs.
On Tuesday, the Alliance Defending Freedom, the conservative public interest law firm, announced that on Phillips’ behalf it had filed an appeal to a court ruling that would mandate its client to bake a cake that was blue on the outside and pink on the inside to transgenderism.
That decision came in June after an activist lawyer, Autumn Scardina, sued Phillips in June 2019 after he refused to craft.
Phillips, who owns the aptly named Masterpiece Cakeshop near Denver, has somewhat successfully made the point that his customized cakes are works of his art and self-expression and thus protected by the First Amendment.
Phillips’ first court bout came in 2012 after he refused to bake a wedding cake for a same-sex marriage. Phillips asserted he would sell the couple a cake but would not make a special one for the ceremony because that would violate his religious faith.
Instead of simply going to another baker, the couple filed a complaint with the Colorado Civil Rights Commission. The board sided with the couple. But Phillips appealed all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which in a 7-2 ruling knocked down the judgment against him because the Human Rights Commission was overtly attacking Phillips’ faith.
Scardina then reignited the controversy with a complaint about Phillips’ refusal to bake her cake.
In that case, Phillips countered by going after the state for persecuting him. This time, in March 2019, the state-backed down, after the ADF found a recording of comments by commissioners who said they supported criticism of Phillips that called his religious freedom claim “despicable.”
Scardina instead sued Phillips in state court. The court eventually ruled against the baker in June, saying he had to bake Scardina’s cake.
In a statement, ADF Legal Counsel Jake Warner said, “No one should be forced to express a message that violates their beliefs and conscience. … This case and others like it represent a disturbing trend: Activists are weaponizing the legal system to ruin those who simply disagree with them. Someone you disagree with might be the one targeted today, but when political winds shift, it could just as easily be you or anyone else tomorrow.”
Warner added, “Jack has been harassed for nearly a decade for living by his faith and making artistic decisions that artists have always made. That’s why we have appealed this decision and will continue to defend the freedom of all Americans to peacefully live and work according to their core convictions without fear of government punishment.”
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All business people have the choice as to who to serve and who not to. Or they should. It’s their business.