Texas considering law similar to Indiana

My parents owned a bed and breakfast near Austin for 15 or so years. Small town and they lived in the house.

A man called one day and asked for availability for his wife and his girlfriend, explaining that it was his birthday. And then asked if there was a tub large enough to fit three people. My mom replied that there are other places that would be more appropriate for his celebration (in a nice way, of course. It's my mom).

Could he have sued and have the state force my parents to allow him and his ladies to stay? It is public accommodations... And her own home. And the values of this town would have agreed with her decision.
 
Hearings are in front of the SCOTUS today in Masterpiece Cakeshop

Kennedy, who is seen as the swing vote, is naturally sending mixed messages
He called discrimination against gays an affront.
But he also said the case had been tainted by hostility to religion.

“Tolerance and acceptance are essential to a free society. It seems the state (of Colorado) has neither been tolerant or accepting of the Baker’s beliefs.
- Justice Kennedy
​
By the way, the record in this case shows that the "cake artist" serves all but would not create custom cakes for events that violate his faith. He offered to serve the guys suing him anything else in shop. The responded with “F–k you and your f-ck-ng homophobic cake shop!”

For its part, the ACLU is arguing that anti-discrimination laws should allow a state to compel speech. However, in a different case (Koontz) they argued that a state cannot enforce an anti-discrimination law due to the 1st Amendment. This is how mixed u the modern ACLU is.

If you have the right to get married, does this also mean you have the right to force someone else to participate in helping to celebrate it?
 
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When we allow the government to force us to work, we have serious problems.

No one who cares about a free society can support this if they think it through, and I'm not being hyperbolic. No one would ever argue that a caterer should be required to offer her services at a nudist colony, or a klan rally, or the GOP convention, or whatever other offensive venue you want to pick. No one would force a print shop to create t-shirts with offensive slogans, or a printer to create obscene images.

If you're an attorney, are you required to take the case of anyone who requests it? Do you have to disclose the reason? If someone comes in that you find morally reprehensible, are you still bound to take that person's case? If I'm working for myself, and I'm doing contract service work, I should be able to decline work for any reason I choose. Maybe I have too much going on, maybe I'm understaffed that week, maybe I'm running low on icing, and maybe I just don't like the way you spoke to my employees. But that's my absolute right as a business owner.

What the law should and does require is that if you're selling t-shirts or baking cakes or any other service that is sold as-is to the general public, I can't refuse to let you buy it. And I haven't seen any examples of this happening. If two gay men wanted to buy a generic wedding cake (if there is such a thing) that's out there for anyone to buy, then they are allowed by law to buy it and do whatever they want with it.
 
Joe Fan said:
Hearings are in front of the SCOTUS today in Masterpiece Cakeshop

Kennedy, who is seen as the swing vote, is naturally sending mixed messages
He called discrimination against gays an affront.
But he also said the case had been tainted by hostility to religion.

“Tolerance and acceptance are essential to a free society. It seems the state (of Colorado) has neither been tolerant or accepting of the Baker’s beliefs.
- Justice Kennedy
​
By the way, the record in this case shows that the "cake artist" serves all but would not create custom cakes for events that violate his faith. He offered to serve the guys suing him anything else in shop. The responded with “F–k you and your f-ck-ng homophobic cake shop!”

For its part, the ACLU is arguing that anti-discrimination laws should allow a state to compel speech. However, in a different case (Koontz) they argued that a state cannot enforce an anti-discrimination law due to the 1st Amendment. This is how mixed u the modern ACLU is.

If you have the right to get married, does this also mean you have the right to force someone else to participate in helping to celebrate it?
Click to expand...

I don't think this decision will be 5-4. My best guess is that at least 1 of Breyer and Kagan, and maybe both, will hold that a commercial establishment has to be open to all comers because selling goods to someone is not "speech", but that customized services are speech and thus can be withheld. As a former First Amendment scholar, Kagan could well write the opinion.
 
He has a point

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Garmel said:
QFT. It's a toss-up between wedding cake and fruitcake in what taste worse.
Click to expand...

I went to a wedding in Chicago where the cake was made of ice cream (the makers were the next door neighbors). The day was warmer than expected so we had to speed the whole thing up, as the "cake" had started to list.
 
I sometimes think they make wedding cakes bland and useless on purpose, so no one will care if you don't cut the cake until a couple of hours into the reception.
 
Joe Fan said:
Sort of the bridesmaid dress effect?
Click to expand...

Not quite because the bridesmaid dresses are supposed to make the bride look good. The cake doesn't really make anything look good.

The measure of a successful wedding cake is that no one sticks their finger in to taste it until the bride cuts into it. That to me is very telling about the cake's quality requirements.
 
This part was interesting as well

Alito pointing out that the baker/artist was punished by Colorado for opposing something — same-sex marriage — that Colorado law itself opposed at the time.

DQU_3XBVAAALTFU.jpg
 
Joe Fan said:
...Kennedy, who is seen as the swing vote, is naturally sending mixed messages...
Click to expand...

Whether Kennedy is alone dispositive on this case or not, it is way past time for this situation to end. It has existed for too long already.

The Court and, by extension, the entire country is in the unfortunate and politically unhealthy position that so many difficult and divisive questions are and have for years been answered, purportedly definitively and for all, usually in foggy and flowery terms, by Anthony M. Kennedy. This is a very messed up situation we find ourselves in.
 
NJlonghorn said:
I don't think this decision will be 5-4. My best guess is that at least 1 of Breyer and Kagan, and maybe both, will hold that a commercial establishment has to be open to all comers because selling goods to someone is not "speech", but that customized services are speech and thus can be withheld. As a former First Amendment scholar, Kagan could well write the opinion.
Click to expand...

I hope they do that, but I don't think they will even if they think it's the legally correct decision. The case is far too political. If Kagan or Breyer side with this Christian baker over a gay couple, a substantial portion of the liberal community will view them as sellouts and traitors. They will be viewed by the Left as Roberts is viewed by the Right. Of course we give federal judges life tenure so that they won't care about that sort of thing, but they undoubtedly do. And it's different for a liberal judge who breaks with the Leftist line. The media will celebrate a conservative who sells out. They won't do that for a liberal who sells out. Furthermore, the stigma is much more acute, because these judges are surrounded by militant liberals every day just because they live in the DC area.

In addition, if you adopt this position, you beg the question of how constitutional the Civil Rights Act would be as applied in a similar case involving a black couple or an interracial couple. If the Court goes in favor of the Christian baker, the next case will involve the white supremacist baker who doesn't want to bake a cake for the black dude getting married to the blonde white chick. Will the Court follow the same logic and side with the racists, or will it try to come up with some intellectually dishonest BS to rationalize screwing the gay couple while protecting the more politically popular interracial couple?
 
Mr. Deez said:
I hope they do that, but I don't think they will even if they think it's the legally correct decision. The case is far too political. If Kagan or Breyer side with this Christian baker over a gay couple, a substantial portion of the liberal community will view them as sellouts and traitors. They will be viewed by the Left as Roberts is viewed by the Right. Of course we give federal judges life tenure so that they won't care about that sort of thing, but they undoubtedly do. And it's different for a liberal judge who breaks with the Leftist line. The media will celebrate a conservative who sells out. They won't do that for a liberal who sells out. Furthermore, the stigma is much more acute, because these judges are surrounded by militant liberals every day just because they live in the DC area.

In addition, if you adopt this position, you beg the question of how constitutional the Civil Rights Act would be as applied in a similar case involving a black couple or an interracial couple. If the Court goes in favor of the Christian baker, the next case will involve the white supremacist baker who doesn't want to bake a cake for the black dude getting married to the blonde white chick. Will the Court follow the same logic and side with the racists, or will it try to come up with some intellectually dishonest BS to rationalize screwing the gay couple while protecting the more politically popular interracial couple?
Click to expand...

The logic is not in the baking of the cake, Deez. Cakes were there to be purchased by any who asked. This baker's refusal to serve lay in his abilities as an artist/decorator. He refused to use his artistic ability to decorate the cake with rainbows and two men. He did not refuse to sell them a cake.

So the analogous proposition would be if you and I (this situation is for illustrative purposes only and is not in any way intended to represent something either of us would ever do, separately or together) decided to go buy a cake before we headed to the KKK rally that night, because even white supremacists like to eat cake, and we went to a black owned bakery to make the purchase.

The baker should not have the right to refuse to sell us a cake out of his existing inventory, but should we be allowed to compel him to custom decorate it with a noose and a flaming cross?
 
Sangre Naranjada said:
Cakes were there to be purchased by any who asked. This baker's refusal to serve lay in his abilities as an artist/decorator. He refused to use his artistic ability to decorate the cake with rainbows and two men. He did not refuse to sell them a cake.
Click to expand...

I understand that, but the same issue is going to come up. A white supremacist baker will be asked to "use his artistic ability to decorate a cake" for a black or interracial couple. It's not going to be a political defensible case like telling the KKK to screw off.
 
And he should be able to refuse, just like the black guy who would theoretically tell the KKK to screw off.

Just as the government is prohibited from blocking political speech, neither can it compel a citizen to speak.
 
NJlonghorn said:
My best guess is that at least 1 of Breyer and Kagan, and maybe both, will hold that a commercial establishment has to be open to all comers because selling goods to someone is not "speech", but that customized services are speech and thus can be withheld.
Click to expand...

Considering that Kagan's response during the questioning period apparently went something along the lines of "but he doesn't have to participate in weddings," I'm pretty sure Kagan's going progressive on this one.
 
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