Appellate court ruling against baker stands after inaction by high court

The Colorado Supreme Court will not hear the case of a Lakewood baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple.

That decision effectively upholds a ruling by the Colorado Court of Appeals that found Masterpiece Cake shop owner Jack Phillips cannot cite his religious beliefs or free-speech rights in refusing to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple.

Phillips’ attorneys, who asked the state’s high court to hear the case, said they are “evaluating all legal options.”

If Phillips’ attorneys continue to pursue the case, one option may be asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case.

In 2012, Charlie Craig and David Mullins were turned away by Phillips while trying to buy a custom wedding cake. Mullins and Craig planned to marry in Massachusetts and wanted a cake to celebrate in Colorado.

Phillips told the couple he would not make them a wedding cake because of his religious beliefs.

“We all have a right to our personal beliefs, but we do not have a right to impose those beliefs on others and discriminate against them,” Ria Tabacco Mar, a staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, said in a statement. “We hope today’s win will serve as a lesson for others that equality and fairness should be our guiding principles and that discrimination has no place at the table, or the bakery as the case may be.”

Colorado law bans discrimination in a public place on grounds of sexual orientation.

In December 2013, Administrative Law Judge Robert N. Spencer said offering the same services to gay couples as heterosexual couples did not violate Phillips’ rights to free speech nor does it prevent him from exercising his religious freedom.

Five months later, Colorado’s seven-member Civil Rights Commission went further and required Phillips to submit quarterly reports for two years showing he was working to change discriminatory practices.

The appeals court’s rulings in August affirmed Spencer’s ruling and the Civil Rights Commission’s order.

In their ruling, the appellate judges found that the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act does not compel the cake shop owner to endorse any religious views. Instead, it prohibits Phillips from discriminating against customers based on their sexual orientation.

In their appeal, Phillips’ attorneys asked the Colorado Supreme Court to decide whether Phillips’ religious beliefs about marriage are being violated. They also asked the justices to consider whether forcing Phillips to create an “artistic expression” that is against his religious beliefs violates his free speech rights.

The state’s high court, which selects the cases it hears, declined to take up the case.

“We asked the Colorado Supreme Court to take this case to ensure that government understands that its duty is to protect the people’s freedom to follow their beliefs personally and professionally, not force them to violate those beliefs as the price of earning a living,” Jeremy Tedesco, senior counsel at the Alliance Defending Freedom, said in a statement. “Jack, who has happily served people of all backgrounds for years, simply exercised the long-cherished American freedom to decline to use his artistic talents to promote a message and event with which he disagrees, and that freedom shouldn’t be placed in jeopardy for anyone.”

The U.S. Supreme Court also selects which cases it hears.