politics

"My we-ligious fweedoms aw being in-fwinged!"

"... That is the most brilliant legal argument we have ever heard, affirmed."

e; For real, they've gotten dangerously close to this already. Fulton v Philadelphia (2021)

The Supreme Court ruled unanimously on Thursday that a Catholic social services agency in Philadelphia could defy city rules and refuse to work with same-sex couples who apply to take in foster children.

If you're saying "wtf do you mean unanimous?!!" all I can say is please just keep reading, there is a reason but it's complicated

The decision, in the latest clash between antidiscrimination principles and claims of conscience, was a setback for gay rights and further evidence that religious groups almost always prevail in the current court.

The court’s surprising consensus on a case that pitted gay rights against religious rights masked deep divisions, with the three most conservative justices issuing caustic concurring opinions criticizing the decision as excessively timid and so narrow as to be meaningless.

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., writing for six members of the court, focused narrowly on the terms of the city’s contract with foster care agencies, which forbids discrimination based on, among other things, sexual orientation. But the contract allows city officials to make exceptions, he wrote, and that doomed the requirement that the Catholic agency must screen same-sex couples.

“The creation of a system of exceptions under the contract undermines the city’s contention that its nondiscrimination policies can brook no departures,” he wrote in the opinion, which was brisk and a little cryptic, suggesting it was the product of extended deliberation and compromise.

The Catholic agency, Chief Justice Roberts wrote, “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.”

The three most conservative justices cast the decision as a missed opportunity.

“After receiving more than 2,500 pages of briefing and after more than a half-year of postargument cogitation, the court has emitted a wisp of a decision that leaves religious liberty in a confused and vulnerable state,” Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. wrote, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil M. Gorsuch. “Those who count on this court to stand up for the First Amendment have every right to be disappointed — as am I.”

The court’s three-member liberal wing — Justices Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan — joined the majority opinion, which was a surprise and may have been part of an effort to avoid a broader ruling that might have allowed religious objections to override all sorts of government policies and programs.

They're claiming their first amendment rights are being violated, and their lawyer has previously gotten the Supreme Court to allow a Catholic adoption agency to discriminate against LGBTQ couples.