Supreme Court sides with Catholic foster agency that excludes same-sex couples in 9-0 ruling
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The Supreme Court sided unanimously with a Catholic foster agency in a dispute against the city of Philadelphia over whether it should be banned from participating in the city's foster program because it excludes same-sex couples.
The group, Catholic Social Services (CSS), claimed that "Philadelphia's attempts to exclude the Catholic Church from foster care" violated the First Amendment. Lawyers for the city, meanwhile, said that CSS "lacks a constitutional right to demand that DHS offer it a contract that omits the same nondiscrimination requirement every other FFCA must follow when performing services for the City."
In a 9-0 ruling, the justices sided with Catholic Social Services.
"CSS seeks only an accommodation that will allow it to continue serving the children of Philadelphia in a manner consistent with its religious beliefs; it does not seek to impose those beliefs on anyone else," Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in a majority opinion. "The refusal of Philadelphia to contract with CSS for the provision of foster care services unless it agrees to certify same-sex couples as foster parents cannot survive strict scrutiny, and violates the First Amendment."
Roberts was joined on his opinion by Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.
Barrett herself wrote a concurring opinion, which was joined fully by Kavanaugh and partially by Breyer.
"As the Court's opinion today explains, the government contract at issue provides for individualized exemptions from its nondiscrimination rule, thus triggering strict scrutiny," Barrett wrote. "And all nine Justices agree that the City cannot satisfy strict scrutiny."
Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee said the Fulton decision was a "great ruling" that could have gone farther.
"It's a pretty unequivocal statement I think that the court is gonna look really closely … any time you have religious institutions or organizations that are being disfavored. If they are treated any worse or any differently than a secular institution, the court's gonna strike that down," Hawley added.
Justice Samuel Alito also wrote a concurring opinion that was joined by Justices Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas. Gorsuch wrote a concurrence that Thomas and Alito joined.
The unanimous ruling on such a hot-button issue comes as many on the left are calling for the packing of the Supreme Court and some on the right are saying the court is rejecting those calls through a series of unanimous of nearly-unanimous opinions. Hawley, however, said he doesn't think the ruling will "deter my friends on the left from their court packing agenda. They're very committed to this. And it will probably make them mad at Justice Breyer, I suppose."
The case will also be considered a massive victory for social conservatives, who say that it protects religious freedom.
"Today, the Supreme Court rightly affirmed that the Constitution guarantees faith-based agencies freedom from government harassment and discrimination because of their religious beliefs about marriage," Catholic Vote President Brian Burch said in a statement.
The ACLU, however, said that the court did not recognize "a license to discriminate based on religious beliefs."
"Opponents of LGBTQ equality have been seeking to undo hard-won non-discrimination protections by asking the court to establish a constitutional right to opt out of such laws when discrimination is motivated by religious beliefs," Leslie Cooper, deputy director of the ACLU LGBTQ & HIV Project, said in a statement. "This is the second time in four years that the court has declined to do so. This is good news for LGBTQ people and for everyone who depends on the protections of non-discrimination laws."
The majority opinion written by Roberts also included a citation of one of the major religious freedom rulings in recent years: the Masterpiece Cakeshop case.
"[O]ur society has come to the recognition that gay persons and gay couples cannot be treated as social outcasts or as inferior in dignity and worth," Roberts wrote, quoting the Masterpiece Cakeshop case. "On the facts of this case, however, this interest cannot justify denying CSS an exception for its religious exercise. The creation of a system of exceptions under the contract undermines the City's contention that its nondiscrimination policies can brook no departures. The City offers no compelling reason why it has a particular interest in denying an exception to CSS while making them available to others."
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Important notes:
Another in a string of unanimous rulings which counter senile Joe's claim that the Court is "Out of whack!"
Second this particular ruling asserts equal treatment at a time when such rulings need to be emphasis.
Finally, maybe all the gay groups will stop sending people into our friend, the cake maker requesting cakes in order to prompt more lawsuits.
Very discriminatory to not allow same sex parents the right to adopt.
The nation's highest Court say's you're wrong.
Actually, that is not what the Court ruled.
Smh
It is, but it is a Catholic funded adoption agency. It would be different if they were gov't subsidized, or just some guy refuses because he likes to disguise his prejudice under the guise of religion.
You better re-read it then. SCOTUS said it was not un-Constitutional, they never said it wasn't discriminatory.
Actually, it didn't but you would have to actually READ the ruling to know that.
Who are all these gay groups asking that bigoted cake maker to make cakes for them? Have you seen those cakes? Who would waste their money on them in the first place?
I would like to know what adopting children has to do with cake baking. Are they giving away children with each cake purchased? Or does each adopted child come with a cake?
No one cares about the cakes, it's all about harassing Jack Phillips yet again
I was wondering that too.
No one was harassing the bigoted baker.
Then maybe vic shouldn't have brought up cakes.
Colorado is.
No, they're not. The bigoted baker is being sued for being a bigoted prick.
Tessy brought up the baker, not Vic
WRONG! That is vic's first comment.
"'She" will lose the lawsuit, yet again
"Important notes:
Another in a string of unanimous rulings which counter senile Joe's claim that the Court is "Out of whack!"
Second this particular ruling asserts equal treatment at a time when such rulings need to be emphasis.
Finally, maybe all the gay groups will stop sending people into our friend, the cake maker requesting cakes in order to prompt more lawsuits."
Are their names Hansel and Gretel? I have just the place for them, hehe. (And they come with cake too!)
Hey, I always thought the woman in that story was justified - they were eating her house.
Such breathtaking originality, have you considered putting your Muse up for adoption? Has she been circumcised or circumfixed? Can she bake a cake?
I still think this is idiotic. Now the state will be forced to send kids to these organizations.
That itself should be illegal.
If only someone would file a lawsuit over this!!!!
Oh, wait, they did!!
So according to states rights republicans, a state should be forced to hand over its foster children to Catholic organizations.
You probably don't realize how accurate that statement is/was.
I can't understand the ruling for you.
What the court seems to be saying is that since the state allows exceptions to the law for one group, they have to have a pretty fucking cogent reason NOT to allow them for CSS, and they didn't prove that they do.
The easiest solution is to deny ANY exceptions to the law, though I don't know all of the reasons why they authorized them for other groups in the first place.
Interesting -
This says to me that if exemptions are allowed by the contract, the city can't pick and choose which exemptions to not honor. Can the city change their contracts to not allow exemptions?
Or write all new contracts?
I am gathering it is more like you are saying and having to do with contract law.
Perhaps the city should do the work themselves and not use any outside agency.
All nine justices agreed the City discriminated on the basis of religion. Not surprised how many opinions here are out of the mainstream and still support and defend discrimination..
And the catholic organization is using discrimination which brought on this whole thing.
Why should discrimination be condoned if it is done by a religious organization.
Why should discrimination be condoned if it is done by a religious organization.
The state is discriminating against religious organizations, just as Colorado is discriminating against Jack Phillips
Not discrimination, free exercise of religion.
Sorry if the unanimous ruling didn't please.
No and No.
So again, if it is wrong for the state to discriminate, why would it not be wrong for the religious organization.
The free exercise of discrimination under the guise of religion is why churches are losing members.
Seriously, where do you find this information????????
Did you understand the ruling?
There are multiple studies, reports and stories all over the internet that support my post. We've talked about a few of them here at NT over the last few years. Church attendance is down in the US generally. The Catholics and Evangelicals have higher numbers of loss which many former members say are due to it's lack of inclusivity and participation of identity politics. Methodists actually gained members.
One thing (my post) has nothing to do with the other thing (this ruling). That would be fairly easy to understand were you to read the post in context of the poster I replied to.
That's because so many don't bother to try and understand the ruling
Simply reading the article would give one answers.
Just another unanimous decision giving lie to the crazy claims of progressive liberals.
Gee, how long before the loons start turning on the more liberal Justices?
They're giving Breyer a lotta grief lately
That's because they are afraid a Republican will win in 2024, and are hoping a Den would get to nominate his replacement before that happens
It’s not a very useful decision in terms of impacting the rest of the country. It’s very narrowly focused. In this case, the city of Philadelphia is the one managing the adoption program. As a manager, the government can’t discriminate on the basis of religion. The ruling doesn’t say anything about say, a state constitution outlawing anti-LGBT discrimination in adoptions or even more generally.
Unfortunately, this is how the Supremes operate in a lot of cases. They find a hair to split and it doesn’t really solve the larger problem for most people. The strikes me as being the opposite of an “activist court.” They are addressing as little of the problem as they absolutely have to. That’s how they got a unanimous ruling.
Solving the big problem is supposed to be the business of Congress, but they’re usually too busy being outraged at each other to get anything done.
So in the end, we had a lot of anticipation and angst with virtually no payoff. Kind of anti-climactic.
I totally agree with you on this.
I'd say yours is the most accurate description on the ruling Tacos.... The ruling creates more problems than Congress has the fortitude to solve.
Exactly.
I can't vote the post up more than once, but I would if I could.
It was more or less kicking the can down the road.
This ruling should make it fairly clear. Religious liberty is here to stay.
That's gonna put the left nuts in a twist.
LOL
This ruling didn’t really establish any such thing. Read Tacos post, his is the most accurate description of the ruling. Yours is just kind of a generic “own the libs” statement. In other words, fucking pointless.