Supreme Court's ruling in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission

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 - What exactly happened in the case, and what does it mean?

The case revolved around Coloradan Jack Phillips, who in 2012 declined to bake a cake for a same-sex wedding, because of his religious objections to same-sex marriage. Phillips stressed repeatedly that he will happily create other products -- such as birthday cakes or graduation cakes -- for gay clients, but reiterated his opposition to gay marriage. A devout Christian, he also refuses to bake cakes for bachelor parties or Halloween.

After a complaint was filed, the Colorado Civil Rights Commission ordered him to change his company policies and undergo anti-discrimination training. That decision was appealed, and today the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Phillips by a 7-2 margin. Justices Elena Kagan and Stephen Breyer, typically viewed as progressives, sided with the Court's more conservative cohort, and Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the majority opinion.

 

I guess it's true that you can't have your cake and eat it too! 

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Clarence Thomas compared the Supreme Court’s gay wedding cake case to cross-burning

Thomas believes that Jack Phillips’ refusal to produce a cake for a union he claims offends his faith deserves the same discussion as cross-burning and racist parades. The fact that same-sex marriage has since been legalized in no way diminishes the issue, he says, nor does it make everyone who doesn’t believe in such unions “bigoted,” or require them to remain silent, he contends.

“This Court is not an authority on matters of conscience, and its decisions can (and often should) be criticized,” Thomas writes. “The First Amendment gives individ­uals the right to disagree about the […]the morality of same-sex marriage.” He warns that legalization of same-sex marriage shouldn’t be “used to stamp out every vestige of dissent and vilify Americans who are unwilling to assent to the new orthodoxy.”