Week 2: Student Response to Discussion One and Two

WednesdayFeb 28 at 6:40pm

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JRN410 – The First Amendment Today – Discussion 1 [Week 2]

Troy Neal

The first amendment of the constitution reads, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.” (Cornell Law School, 2017). The on-going argument as it pertains to the constitution is that of interpretation and how we relate it to these modern times, my example story is that of a baker out of Colorado and how he refuses to create custom wedding cakes for same-sex marriages.

Jack Phillips, who has owned his own bakery since 1993, recently came under fire in his home state of Colorado for refusing to create a custom wedding cake for a same-sex couple. This, of course, brings up the issue of discrimination and how the lines can eventually blur when it comes down to instances of personal beliefs and religion versus equality and rights. After many different claims were disputed, “the only claim left is that Mr. Phillips’s expressive choice causes what some refer to as dignitary harm: the distress of confronting ideas one finds demeaning or hurtful. Yet accepting that justification would shatter what the court in Texas v. Johnson (1989) called a “bedrock principle” — namely that “the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive.” (George & Girgis, 2017).

In the end, creating a custom wedding cake should legally fall under the statue of creative work, which is constitutionally protected by the first amendment, thus giving Mr. Phillips every right to choose what he specially creates and for whom. The reason this is different from him just selling the couple a cake is the simple fact that they did not want just an off the shelf cake, which Phillips has many of on a daily basis. Instead, they wanted a custom cake which falls under artistic expression and is protected.

References

George, R, and Girgis, S. (2017). A Baker’s First Amendment Rights. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/04/opinion/first-amendment-wedding-cake.html?rref=collection%2Ftimestopic%2FFirst%20Amendment%20(US%20Constitution) (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site.