The Supreme Court ruled in favor of a Colorado baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple because of his religious beliefs.

Jack Phillips, the owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado, refused to bake a cake for couple Charlie Craig and David Mullins. The case reached the Supreme Court, which ruled 7-2 for Phillips, citing respect for his religious beliefs in his

The court took issue with a Colorado commission and its treatment of Phillips. Per the Associated Press:

The court ruled that the Colorado Civil Rights Commission’s actions violated the free exercise clause. In arguments before the court in December, Justine Anthony Kennedy, the author of all the court’s major gay-rights cases, worried that a ruling in favor of Phillips might allow shop owners to put up signs saying “We do not bake cakes for gay weddings.” But later, Kennedy said the Colorado Civil Rights Commission seemed “neither tolerant nor respectful of Mr. Phillips’ religious beliefs” when it found his refusal to bake a cake for the gay couple violated the state’s anti-discrimination law. The case pitted Phillips’ First Amendment claims of artistic freedom against the anti-discrimination arguments of the Colorado commission, and the two men Phillips turned away in 2012.

[image via screengrab]

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