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January 13, 2015 12:30 PM UTC

State Republicans Introduce Discrimination Restoration Legislation

  • 20 Comments
  • by: Jason Salzman

(Promoted by Colorado Pols)

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Last year, conservative talk-radio hosts wrapped their loving arms around a baker for discriminating against a gay couple by refusing to bake them a wedding cake.

The baker said his cake-selling preferences flowed from his religious views, but, as a judge nicely articulated, it was actually factually illegal discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Radio hosts did live broadcasts from the cake shop, hot bigotry was served to anyone listening, and the baker was fined by the great State of Colorado.

Now Colorado Republicans are proposing a law allowing student clubs to violate campus anti-discrimination policies and still receive university benefits (funds, facilities, etc.). Sponsors include Tim Neville and Laura Woods on the State Senate side, and brother Patrick Neville and Stephen Humphrey on the House side.

Similar legislation, allowing raw discrimination against women, gays, or potentially any of us, is under consideration across the country. One, for example, could allow restaurants to refuse service to LGBT people. Or pharmacists to stop filling prescriptions for birth-control pills. Another would permit adoption agencies to reject potential same-sex parents.

Collectively, these bills are referred to as religious-freedom-restoration bills, but a more accurate name is discrimination-restoration legislation. Political observers expect CO Republicans to introduce broader discrimination restoration bills this session, beyond the narrow university-focused proposal currently on the table.

Colorado Attorney General John Suthers was on the radio last month, urging listeners, who were upset about the bigoted baker, to push their legislators to enact bills that allow discrimination under the guise of religious freedom.

Suthers: I think what’s different, Jimmy, and 1964 and the time of the Civil Rights cases is, if a black person when into a restaurant in the South in 1963 and was refused service, he couldn’t walk into a restaurant next door and get service, for the most part.  Everybody was refused service. That’s not the atmosphere we have today. We have this guy, who as a matter of his religious beliefs, would prefer not to do that. We have plenty of guys down the street who are perfectly willing to do it. I just don’t think it’s the same atmosphere. I think the legislature ought to be sensitive to that fact. But the Colorado legislature, with the majority at certain points in time, has not been.

I asked Denise Maes, Public Policy Director of the American Civil Liberties of Colorado, which brought the initial complaint against the baker who refused service to the gay people, to respond to Suthers' comment:

Maes: The Attorney General is arguing that one should be able to break the law and discriminate because others "down the street" aren't or won't.  He misses the entire point and ignores the damage done both to the people who are discriminated against and the business community at large.  No one wants to live or do business in a state where discrimination is the law of the land.

Totally agree.

Suthers himself agrees that, as of now, the law of land forbids the cake-baker-type of discrimination. That's why, as AG, he pursued a case against the baker, Suthers said on the radio. Below, Suthers explains how he sees Colorado law now. It's a nice articulation of the way things stand. The problem is, Suthers wants to toss this out the window.

Suthers: We have a law in Colorado, our Public accommodations law. And a couple years ago when Democrats were in charge of both houses, they inserted sexual orientation along with race and gender as protective classes. And so in Colorado, essentially, sexual orientation has essentially the same protection as race in terms of anti-public discrimination laws.

So, if you have a business, whether it be a motel business, restaurant business, cake shop, and hold yourself out to the public, you must abide by this public accommodations law. And in this case, it was alleged, that a gay couple who’d been married in another state, wanted to have a celebration in Colorado, went into this cake shop, were very frank with the owner about what they wanted to do, and he refused to bake them a cake, despite the fact that they could have walked a blocked and got the cake at another bake store….it does appear this individual violated the public accommodations law, so the case was brought…”

Sengenberger: “We’re talking about First Amendment freedom of religion, and if gay activities are in violation of that, and they want to run their business in accordance with their religious views, do they not have legal protection?”

Suthers: “Only if the practice is part of the practice of religion. Therein lies the problem, Jimmy. The reason why I think the state is going to win this case throughout is that baking cakes is not the exercise of religion. If you told the Catholic Church they had to marry gay couples, then you’re violating the First Amendment. It’s complicated, and there is a long line of cases about it, but sadly enough, I think the State is going to win this case.”

Suthers nails it, doesn't he? The only problem is, he actually wants to make baking cakes a religious activity! And not just baking but everything. Taking photos of a wedding, issuing marriage licences, counseling gay students. Suthers wants religion to be everywhere and in everything, allowing discrimination against anyone anywhere. That may sound extreme, but the potential is seriously there.

It's what discrimination restoration bills, like the one proposed here in Colorado, would do.

LISTEN HERE TO SUTHERS ON KNUS' JIMMY SENGENBERGER SHOW, AIRED DEC. 20, 2014. (@ 1:36:00)

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20 thoughts on “State Republicans Introduce Discrimination Restoration Legislation”

  1. I was young when the Civil Rights movement swept the South and, in fact, the entire nation. In those days, there were people who openly stated that part of their religious beliefs held the races should be separated and in essence, live apart from each other, including laws to enforce such attitudes which made, for example, interracial marriage illegal. Before the Civil War, there were southern ministers who proclaimed the Bible supported slavery and the subjugation of African-Americans. All of that was swept away first, by the Civil War and then, a century later, by the Civil Rights Movement. 

    However, under former Attorney General Suther's reasoning those kinds of attitudes, even though they have nothing to do with the Christian religion or the practice of that religion, would again be allowed and therefore discrimination against certain categories of people could flourish again. Baking a cake has nothing to do with practicing Christianity nor does the race of someone's spouse have anything to do with it. The fact a baker down the street won't discriminate is not a reason to allow discrimination. Passing laws to allow discrimination based on religion is like forcing African-Americans to the back of the bus again.

    We can never go back.

  5. How cute. There's still a law on the state's books about this. And even if, by some strange alchemy it got through the legislature, the governor would never sign it, nor would he let it lie on his desk and become law without signing it. Say what you will about Hick, he won't go for this. 

    1. Precisely,notskinny  like most business community, Hick is enlightened on social issues.  Why waste time hating people who can make you rich?  The groom's are gay?  Let the meat cake!

       

      1. Precisely,notskinny  like most business community, Hick is enlightened on social issues.  Why waste time hating people who can make you rich?  The groom's are gay?  Let them eat cake!

  8. Suthers has it right in his summary of what the law is and the difference between a private business and a church.  He runs aground when he says, however, that a law must be passed so that bakers can refuse service because "the couple can go down the street".  What if there isn't a baker "down the street"?  Colorado is a largely rural state.  What if there isn't an emergency room or a pharmacy "down the street".   If you want to open your business as a service to the public, you can't pick and choose who that public is.  If you want to proselytize, then open a church–and you can kick people out at will (even if they are dead, as we've seen with New Hope Ministries in Lakewood).  Chances are, given the size of some of the mega churches these days, you will probably make more money than as a baker anyway.

    1. Religious freedom restoration sounds an awful lot like civil rights destruction. People can claim all kinds of discrimination is demanded in the name of their religions. Heck, they can invent new religions for the sole purpose of incorporating beliefs to allow them to discriminate against anyone. Why not a religion that forbids race mixing or declares one race superior, allowing for discrimination against all other races and against mixed families? That forbids allowing women to be in supervisory positions over men? That allows Christians to discriminate against non-Christians? It's a back door to allowing any and every type of discrimination in the name of religion. And not as an unintended consequence. That's exactly the intended consequence af all of this legislation.

      1. That's what the Southern Baptist church was, B.C. It split off of the American Baptist church during the Civil War. The Southern Baptists defended and wanted to retain slavery. The American Baptists were abolitionists  

         

  9. Here's a tragic consequence of this kind of thinking – that religious persuasion trumps human rights and common decency. Someone posted this on another thread, but it bears repeating.

    Family, friends protest New Hope Ministries' last-minute refusal to host lesbian's funeral

    Relatives Livid After Colorado Church Objects to Lesbian's Funeral

    I have friends who are now worried about  what would happen  to their loved ones in the event of an unexpected death.

    I can't wait to see what rightie talk radio makes of this. Will they defend the pastor's decision? Will they defend the deceased's second amendment rights to be careless? (She shot herself while cleaning her gun). Will they just try to ignore the whole thing?

    1. Her death and the callous way her church treated her family during her funeral really must be putting the right wingers on the horns of a dilemma.  The ammosexuals may feel a certain degree of compassion for a fellow gun enthusiast but the religious nuts will see nothing wrong with the way in which the church acted.

      BTW, I don't have a problem with a church not wishing to bestow any sacraments, rites or rituals on anyone not adhering to its rules and regulations (e.g., the Catholic Church does not marry heterosexual couples who have been previously married and divorced to other parties, nor will it marry same sex couples regardless of prior marital status).  But the church should have made clear prior to the funeral that they wouldn't conduct it.

      1. Right, Frank. The church's acceptance of the $400 deposit for the space rental, and the agreement to let the pastor screen the video beforehandconstituted a legally binding contract, I would think. 

        This is going to keep on circulating nationwide, keeping Colorado on the front lines of the social issue culture wars. 

  10. Tell me, is the New Hope Ministries (that's a hell of a misnomer if you're GLB or T) church building located in close proximity to the homophobic bakery?  Maybe Lakewood could zone all the bigoted businesses together.

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