Facebook Email Font Size: Civil rights attorney argues that recent Supreme Court religious liberty cases jeopardize antidiscrimination laws. The U.S. Supreme Court held in 1984 that the First Amendment “gives no one the right to insist that, in pursuit of their own interests, others must conform their conduct to his own religious necessities.” But 37 years later, in 2021, the Court ruled that a Catholic organization could refuse to place foster children with same-sex couples on religious grounds. Can these seemingly incompatible decisions be reconciled? They cannot, contends Louise Melling , Deputy Legal Director at the American Civil Liberties Union . Melling argues in a recent article that the Supreme Court’s 2021 decision in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia , along with other recent religious liberty rulings, undermines substantial precedent establishing that the U.S. Constitution does not protect the right to publicly discriminate. Such decisions, Melling contends , could upend federal, state, and local antidiscrimination laws and jeopardize the legacy of the civil rights era . Melling points to the case of 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis , which the Court will rule on sometime in June. 303 Creative concerns a Christian website designer who asserts the right to […]
