Justice Kennedy’s <em>Masterpiece </em>Ruling
When the Supreme Court opened its October term last year, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission—the “gay wedding cake” case—loomed as a blockbuster, a major step toward resolving conflicts between religious freedom and anti-discrimination laws protecting LGBT people in general and same-sex married couples in particular.
But someone left the cakeshop in the rain.
On Monday, the Supreme Court produced the melted remnant. By a contentious majority of 7–2, the Court held for the religious baker, Jack Phillips, who had refused to sell a cake to a same-sex couple, Charlie Craig and Dave Mullins, for a post-hoc celebration of their out-of-state wedding. It used a rationale applicable only to this case, which sheds no light on the larger civil-rights issues.
It was obvious at oral argument in December that the case had what Supreme Court insiders call “vehicle problems”—meaning that the facts andAdam Liptak the concept of a “clean vehicle.”)
