ICC Note: In 2012, a florist from Washington State was accused, and eventually found guilty, of discrimination for declining to provide arrangements for a same-sex wedding. However, in light of the recent Supreme Court decision in favor of Masterpiece Cakeshop, the US Supreme Court has requested that the Washington Supreme Court revisit the florist’s case. The Washington Supreme Court will be evaluating whether the florist received a fair trial, or if the ruling was carried out with bias toward her religion.

06/25/2018 United States (Christian News Network) – The U.S. Supreme Court has asked the Washington State Supreme Court to revisit a ruling against a florist who was found guilty of discrimination for providing referrals to a regular customer who wanted her to furnish his same-sex ceremony, directing the court to review the matter in light of the high court’s Masterpiece Cakeshop decision, which found that hostility toward religion unfairly influenced the legal judgment.

The Washington Supreme Court will now need to examine whether or not Barronelle Stutzman of Arlene’s Flowers received a fair trial by the state courts. The U.S. Supreme Court had ruled earlier this month in the Masterpiece Cakeshop case that decision-makers must be neutral toward religion in contemplating whether or not a violation of the law was committed, not being prejudiced against it.

“As the record shows, some of the commissioners at the Commission’s formal, public hearings endorsed the view that religious beliefs cannot legitimately be carried into the public sphere or commercial domain, disparaged Phillips’ faith as despicable and characterized it as merely rhetorical, and compared his invocation of his sincerely held religious beliefs to defenses of slavery and the Holocaust,” wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy on behalf of the 7-2 majority on June 4.

“The Commission’s hostility was inconsistent with the First Amendment’s guarantee that our laws be applied in a manner that is neutral toward religion. Phillips was entitled to a neutral decision-maker who would give full and fair consideration to his religious objection as he sought to assert it in all of the circumstances in which this case was presented, considered, and decided,” he said.

The court did not reach, however, whether or not business owners may decline to fulfill orders surrounding same-sex events, but said, “The outcome of cases like this in other circumstances must await further elaboration in the courts, all in the context of recognizing that these disputes must be resolved with tolerance, without undue disrespect to sincere religious beliefs, and without subjecting gay persons to indignities when they seek goods and services in an open market.”

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