i still say it's easier to make them a cake that tastes bad or shoot pictures that are blurry and out of focus than fighting them in court and have fun doing it
Posted on 04/28/2016 12:07:55 PM PDT by Rio
The Gresham bakers who made national headlines after refusing to bake a cake for a same-sex wedding are fighting back against Oregon regulators.
In a brief filed in the Oregon Court of Appeals this week, Aaron and Melissa Klein say the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries violated state and federal laws by forcing them to pay $135,000 in damages to the lesbian couple.
The legal team behind Sweet Cakes by Melissa argues the labor bureau violated the Kleins' rights as artists to free speech, their rights as Oregonians to religious freedom and their rights as defendants to a due process.
They also argue the fine was excessive and that Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian, who praised an LGBTQ advocacy group on Facebook the year before the hearing, should have recused himself.
"There is little to be said for [the bureau's] interpretation" of the law, the Kleins' attorneys wrote in a 615-page brief. "It lacks support in statute or precedent, equates being gay with a celebration rejected by many gay people, and forces people to convey messages against their will and religious beliefs — all while, at a minimum, raising serious constitutional questions."
And the Kleins' court fight, though based in Oregon, could have national implications. At a time when North Carolina and Mississippi have passed laws allowing businesses to refuse service to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender customers, the Kleins have challenged a decade-old Oregon law that prevents that kind of discrimination.
That means whatever happens to the Kleins here could ultimately shape what happens to florists, photographers and bakers across the country.
"This case gives us pause, as does what we see happening across the country," said Jeanna Frazzini, co-director of LGBTQ advocacy group Basic Rights Oregon. "It's really been striking the way the Kleins have become poster children for this movement across the country that aims to undermine the very basic civil rights and human dignity of LGBT people."
The controversy began three years ago when Rachel Bowman-Cryer and her mother, Cheryl McPherson, visited the bakery to test cakes for Bowman-Cryer's upcoming wedding.
Bowman-Cryer had purchased a cake from Sweet Cakes by Melissa before, but this time, Aaron Klein turned her away. Klein said his company didn't bake cakes for same-sex weddings.
Rachel Bowman-Cryer said during the BOLI hearing that the experience left her "humiliated and ashamed and destroyed and questioning — questioning whether anybody or not would accept us as a married couple."
She and her wife, Laurel Bowman-Cryer, filed complaints with Oregon's Bureau of Labor and Industries.
An administrative judge ruled the Kleins had violated an Oregon law that bans discrimination against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people in jobs and in places that serve the public.
Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian ordered the Kleins last year to pay the Bowman-Cryer's damages for emotional and mental suffering.
"This case is not about a wedding cake or a wedding," Avakian, now a candidate for Oregon secretary of state, wrote in his final order. "It is about a business's refusal to serve someone because of their sexual orientation. Under Oregon law, that is illegal. Within Oregon's public accommodations law is the basic principle of human decency that any person, regardless of their sexual orientation, has the freedom to fully participate in society."
The Kleins have said all along they planned to appeal. And the brief repeats many of the arguments the Kleins made earlier in the case. It focuses on big ideas — such as the freedom of religion — as much as it does on small details, including posts on Avakian's Facebook page.
The appeal "continues to drag out a case that has been extremely painful for the (lesbian) couple involved," Frazzini said.
The Sweet Cakes case was one of several religious freedom disputes tried last year as part of a national debate that's intensified since a June 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision established same-sex marriage as a constitutional right.
Last month, the Washington State Supreme Court agreed to hear the case of florist Barronelle Stutzman, a Richmond, Wash. woman who refused to provide flowers for a longtime customer's same-sex ceremony.
And on Monday, the Colorado Supreme Court declined to take an appeal from a Denver-area "cake artist" who'd been ordered to make desserts for same-sex weddings.
But few defendants have attracted as much notoriety as the Kleins. Donors from across the country have contributed more than half a million dollars to the Gresham couple. And in February, a former lawyer for President George H.W. Bush, took over their case. C. Boyden Gray, working with nonprofit law firm First Liberty, will represent the Kleins at no cost.
First Liberty senior counsel Ken Klukowski said the Kleins asked his Plano, Texas, firm to take on their case. He agreed because he believes theirs "is an issue of paramount importance for the nation."
"This is one of the most important cases in the country regarding how religious liberty is going to coexist in our society with new attitudes regarding marriage," Klukowski told The Oregonian/OregonLive in February. "The first amendment guarantees every person fundamental right to free speech and the free exercise of religion, how you act out your faith -- not just the words you say."
Kind of hard to separate the two. It's like saying, "But your honor, I didn't refuse him service because he was Jewish. I refused him service because he was wearing a Yarmulke." Hell hath no fury like a lesbian scorned and they used the state and the law to extract their revenge far out of proportion to the damages. That's probably their best argument on appeal; the punishment far out-weighed the infraction.
IIRC, GoFundMe kicked them out in a huff early in this saga. Eventually another site picked them up, and I believe it is this site at ContinueToGive.com/, but if I were to donate, I would check to make sure it is still their legitimate site:
ContinueToGive: Help Sweetcakes by melissa
Sweet Cakes By Melissa Facebook page
This Portland media station's story from July 2015 says Continue to Give is indeed their site:
New U.S. Attorney General.
State courts, not federal.
i still say it's easier to make them a cake that tastes bad or shoot pictures that are blurry and out of focus than fighting them in court and have fun doing it
Freedom of association, under pressure for decades, is gone.
Exactly. And toleration has been redefined from leaving people alone to live their lives as they see fit without interference to the so-called “right” to force people to take part in other people’s lives whether they want to or not.
Sweet Cakes did not refuse to make a cake because the customers were gay. They refused to make a wedding cake to celebrate a gay marriage. It was the activity that they did not want to support. At the time, the activity was not even legal in Oregon.
Westboro has a Constitutional right to hold God Hates Fags rallies. Why should gay caterers be allowed to refuse to support a Constitutionally protected activity?
And yes, they are hate-filled assholes, but hate-filled assholes have the same rights as gay activists.
Not at all. It is more analogous to the difference between refusing to serve someone because they are Jewish and refusing to cater a Kosher bar mitzvah.
You can't really separate the two.
Westboro has a Constitutional right to hold God Hates Fags rallies. Why should gay caterers be allowed to refuse to support a Constitutionally protected activity?
People in Missouri have a constitutionally protected right to open carry. If I own a business I can deny them entry if they are carrying a weapon and I'm not breaking the law. Now if I refused entry to only black gun owners then it'd be discrimination and the state can go after me.
And yes, they are hate-filled assholes, but hate-filled assholes have the same rights as gay activists.
Depends on the circumstances.
Here is a better analogy.
Let’s say you are an artist. You have a gallery in which you sell existing paintings but you also do custom portraits. If a gay couple wants to buy one of your existing paintings and you refuse because they are gay, then you are discriminating against them on the basis of their homosexuality. If a gay couple wants to commission you to paint a portrait of them kissing (or nude or having sex) and you refuse, are you discriminating against them on the basis of their homosexuality?
Yes, that is an extreme scenario, but entirely analogous. Sweet Cakes did not refuse to sell a lesbian couple any products off their shelves. In fact, the lesbian couple were existing customers that the bakery had sold products to before. They refused, however, to create a wedding cake for them and decorate it to celebrate a gay wedding that they found offensive to their religious beliefs.
Hmm... good point. I suppose money’s probably the main motivator. The fact they can put a Christian baker out of business was a bonus deal.
I’m surprised we haven’t seen a lot of ‘ask a homo baker to bake a Traditional Marriage’ cake videos or something like it.
Yep - democrats ran out of ‘real’ problems to get upset about 30 years ago. Now they have to stoke the flames of division to keep their jobs. What is next after every queer and tranny get what they want? Start fighting for pedophiles and zoophiliacs?
Native Americans need some stirring up. and America is ripe for guilt. I predict we’ll see them start making headlines next year, especially if Trump wins.
Sure you can. As the other poster said, it's the difference in refusing to serve someone because they're Jewish and refusing to cater their Bar Mitzvah. This is not a hard distinction to understand.
But you have to understand how Obama has obtained so many judicial victories. The Justice Department sends out memoranda to all levels of appellate courts in the U.S.; and if an issue is really hot-button, they send legal representatives to join the suits or provide pressure on the attorneys. The DOJ actually sent taxpayer-funded “advisors” to the street demonstrations over Trayvon Martin and against George Zimmerman.
Certainly this gay marriage vs. religious liberty case is a hot button issue.
That would depend on why you refused to cater it, wouldn't it?
If you do portraits of heterosexuals kissing (or nude of having sex) then yes you are. If you have never done such portraits then no you aren't.
They refused, however, to create a wedding cake for them and decorate it to celebrate a gay wedding that they found offensive to their religious beliefs.
And I'm not arguing that they should have suffered the punishment they received. The problem with cases like this is that one side can have their rights respected only when the other side has their rights denied. Legally the customer had the right not to be discriminated against based on their sexual orientation. Constitutionally the Klein's have the right to practice their faith as their conscience dictates. Rather than choose sides the government should never have been involved.
But a hard comparison to make. What would be the gentile equivalent of a Bar Mitzvah?
I don’t think it’s all that difficult to separate the two things.
First, Sweet Cakes had already served the complainant by providing cake for other events.
Second, the specific demand was for a cake celebrating a homosexual “marriage”, which for the Kleins is an event with specific religious connotations, and under their religion is recognized as a one-man, one-woman institution.
To conflate the two requires disregarding the rights of the Kleins to act on their religious belief.
JMO, of course.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.