The Supreme Court today sent back to lower courts a similar dispute over a florist who declined to create flower arrangements for a same-sex wedding based on her “Christian” beliefs.
Reuters reports:
The justices threw out a 2017 ruing by Washington state’s Supreme Court that Barronelle Stutzman, owner of Arlene’s Flowers in the city of Richland, about 200 miles (320 km) southeast of Seattle, had violated the state’s anti-discrimination law and a consumer protection measure.
The court ordered the top Washington state court to revisit the case in light of its ruling on June 4 in favor of Colorado baker Jack Phillips, who similarly cited his Christian beliefs in refusing to make a wedding cake for a gay couple.
The Supreme Court’s 7-2 ruling earlier this month in the case of Jack Phillips, owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop, did not resolve whether an array of same-sex marriage opponents can refuse commercial services available to opposite-sex couples and leaves unresolved the central dispute between proponents of gay rights and religious objectors: whether anti-discrimination laws in 22 states