After Scoring Partial SCOTUS Win in Gay Wedding Cake Case, Baker Refuses Service to Transgender Woman and Ends Up in Court Again – By Jerry Lambe (Law & Crime) / Mar 23 2021
A Colorado baker who refused to bake a wedding cake for a gay couple and was vindicated with a partial victory in 2018 at the Supreme Court of the United States now finds himself back in court yet again — this time for refusing to bake a birthday cake for a transgender woman.
Attorney Autumn Scardina ordered a birthday cake from Masterpiece Cakeshop in 2017 on the same day the Supreme Court announced it would hear owner Jack Phillips’ appeal following losses at the federal and circuit court levels. Scardina requested a cake that was intended to celebrate her gender transition. The inside of the cake was to be pink; the outer layer was to be blue.
In both cases, Phillips claimed that being forced to bake the cakes would conflict with his closely held religious beliefs.
The original wedding cake case pitted the legal issues of religious freedom against sexual orientation discrimination. The issues occurred when a state commission accused Phillips of discriminating against gay people in violation of Colorado’s public accommodations law. Phillips argued that this was not the case; rather, he was simply refusing to actively participate in a gay wedding because it violated his Christian values.
