We have previously discussed (here and here) the growing conflicts over businesses that decline to accommodate same-sex weddings and events in a clash between anti-discrimination and free speech (and free exercise) values. Despite my support for gay rights and same-sex marriage, I have previously written that anti-discrimination laws are threatening the free exercise of religion. Some of these cases involve bakeries that insist that making wedding cakes for same-sex couples violates their religious principles. Now we have a twist on this trending litigation. The Azucar Bakey has been found to have broken discrimination laws by refusing to make an anti-same-sex cake. The bakery was asked to make a Bible-shaped cake with an anti-gay slur and owner Marjorie Silva refused. The customer brought a complaint to the Colorado Civil Rights Commission and won.
The customer wanted the bakery to draw two males holding hands with “a big ‘X’ on them.”
Silva identifies herself as a practicing Christian and makes Christian cakes, but balked at making an anti-gay cake at her Lakewood bakery in December 2013. Previously in Colorado, Masterpiece Cakeshop owner Jack Phillips broke discrimination laws when he refused to make a cake for the same-sex wedding of Dave Mullins and Charlie Craig in July of 2012. That decision was upheld by the Colorado Civil Rights Commission.
Now we have the flip side. Silva offered to leave the bible page blank to allow the customer (who she describes as disruptive) to write whatever he wanted but she declined to write it herself. Ironically, she could have simply refused to serve him on the basis for any disruption in the store. She was later sent a notice by the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies (DORA) that a religious discrimination complaint has been filed against Azucar Bakery. She has since received a notice from DORA requesting a final letter describing her account of events.
The question raised by these cases is whether anti-discrimination laws are driving too deeply into free speech rights. Bakers and photographers view themselves as engaged in a form of speech generally. The loss of a bright-line defining free speech has meant that we are finding ourselves increasingly on a slippery slope of speech regulation. On the other hand, we fought hard to guarantee accommodation for all races in places of public accommodation. Stores are not allowed to ban black customers under the same rationale. The question is whether there is a difference between refusing to serve customers on the basis for sexual orientation generally as opposed to taking an active or direct role in a same-sex wedding.
Where do you think we should draw the line?
Source: KDVR
fiver:
“that those long hours, when worked, are worked in lieu of hiring a manager”
Why do you say that? You think that hiring a manager means that the owner must be an absentee investor? If you hire a super to run a job, you just never show up? Never do research, paperwork, bids, anything? You just convert oxygen to carbon dioxide and get paid?
Must be nice.
Perhaps you are unaware that, for example, franchise restaurant owners typically make $80,000. Many also work long hours. That includes having restaurant managers. Doubling minimum wage will make them actually lose money. That’s another lovely Liberal policy.
Well, this was a nice segue into why businesses strive to write off each and every thing they can.
fiver:
“Nor do those whose sole qualification is marrying a business owner.
Otherwise they might learn that workers’ comp insurance payments are a write off, not a tax;”
Thank you so much for explaining this to my little woman’s brain. I never said work comp or insurance were taxes. Why would you think that? That came after my remark that I was shocked at how high he paid taxes.
Let me explain something. Work comp in the industry my husband works in requires him to match 30% of his employee’s salary, last time I checked. It does not come out of the salary; it’s in addition to the salary. Yes, he writes it off, which means he does not pay taxes on what he paid for the work comp. But the amount he paid is STILL GONE. Understand?
So, if he had to pay $30,000 for work comp, that’s really super that he saved money in taxes on what he paid, which would have added insult to injury. Why should he be taxed on work comp? But that $30,000 is still gone out of his bank account. AND if any of his employees gets hurt, that amount goes up.
Get it?
My remark was that it is absurdly expensive to run a business in CA, which is ranked as one of the least business friendly states in the union. Obviously, it’s run by Liberals who tend to have anti-business policies.
The truly sad aspect about our high tax rate is the “inheritance tax.”
Someone works long hours to build a successful business, and then discovers that if he wants to leave it to his children, they’ll have to pay huge taxes in order to receive it.
So, the owner pays enormous taxes every year for the business, and when he dies, his heirs have to pay a huge percentage of taxes in order to inherit the business, and then they promptly start paying taxes annually, on top of it. How many times can they tax the same business?
This basically makes it impossible to inherit the family ranch, family home, or family business.
So, when you work to build something, it’s not for your kids, but rather for the strangers who buy it. No more multigenerational ranches, either.
Nor do those whose sole qualification is marrying a business owner.
Otherwise they might learn that workers’ comp insurance payments are a write off, not a tax; that those long hours, when worked, are worked in lieu of hiring a manager (i.e. management not ownership); and that most small businesses operate significantly on loans, not personal capital.
But maybe that’s just being “usurious.”
fiver wrote: “… those long hours, when worked, are worked in lieu of hiring a manager (i.e. management not ownership);”
Who has the money to do that, and where do you find a manager you can trust to do that? How can there be enough money left over for the business owner and his family? What you are suggesting is that a smart business owner doesn’t work. He hires people to work for him. You clearly do not understand what goes into earning a living and creating a successful business. Only a wealthy businessman can do what you are suggesting, and if the manager he hires can’t respond to the marketplace and make smart decisions, that business won’t be in business long. Most of us business owners do not operate that way. I regularly work 14 hour days and have been doing it so long that I do not think much about it. I am always the first one in the office and the last to leave. I work hard because I need to earn money me and my family, and my business is the way that I do that.
fiver wrote: “… and that most small businesses operate significantly on loans, not personal capital.”
I have been in business for 25 years, and I have never taken a business loan. I reach into my own pocket. Even if I take one of the loans constantly being offered to me in the mail, I am personally on the hook for it and they have high interest rates because it is not easy to start a business. Most fail because some neophytes think if they just hang a shingle out, people from all over will flock to them and give them money. The truth is that I am not relating much to what you are saying about how a small business operates.
I’m trying to figure out where you are coming from. Are you a wealthy businessman? Do you have any experience in creating and running a small business?
Davidm2575 said …
Heck, we also are made into tax collectors by the government, and not by choice. It deceives the public into thinking that the business takes the money from them and the government gives it back to them!
Oh noes…you just let the bird out of the bag! Never mind those pesky federal forms 940 & 941, or the W-2’s, 3’s & 4’s, yada yada… or the myriad state forms for your collection reporting. Governments are getting trickier and trickier these days, deciding to tax at the wholesale level for some “consumption” taxes…like the IRS has for a decade or two on federal fuel excise taxes…collected from the wholesaler, who charges the retailer already taxed, not the “ultimate vendor” … e.g., the retailer. If you have an exemption, you give proof to the retailer and he/she in turns applies for a refund of the tax paid at wholesale. You might even see a credit on your account in 90 to 180 days. No one is ever told how they’re paying that way…it’s so transparent it is invisible.
Now I am off to hear Obama pontificate…or what ever.
Good heavens. Do people really think businesses don’t pay taxes???
When I married my husband, a business owner, I thought his accountant must be barking mad. He MUST have gotten the taxes wrong by a factor of 10. That CAN’T be what it costs for work comp! Insurance costs HOW MUCH?
Nope. All correct.
Which is why businesses frantically write off every nickel and dime they can.
People who are employees have NO IDEA how usurious the government is on taxes. Business owners typically work much longer hours than employees, risk their own capital, and pay far more in taxes.
Lee:
“I do think the baker should have the right of refusal. He will quickly find out if he loses customers from the word of mouth if his decision was a good one or not..
I don’t recall who wrote it upthread but the best answer is suggest another bakery.”
I agree. Let’s just use common sense and not legislate every opinion and thought.
And the majority of people oppose the ACA, or want it significantly revised.
So, it’s not just me who was wrecked.
Just wait until the employer mandate hits. Anyone who inflicts Obamacare on the rest of the public won’t be able to hold public office in a town with a population above 3.
Lee – all you have to do is call your doctor and ask him or her if Obamacare caused more paperwork.
Obamacare doubled my premiums, increased my deductible 1100%, slashed and burned doctor choice, and destroyed drug formulary.
So, I now pay as much as a mortgage for a 2nd home for insurance that used to cost me a few hundred a month, but I STILL have to pay out of pocket to see a doctor.
Plus, as I mentioned on another thread, I’m stuck paying for pediatric dental insurance that, again, no reputable establishment accepts. The only one I can find that accepts it is a clinic that straps kids down on papoose boards, and won’t let the parents accompany. So, again, I’m wasting money on premiums for county-style care, and I still have to pay out of pocket to take my kid to a dentist.
In the “old days”, if I wanted dental insurance, I would shop around for a policy that covered my dentist, had the coverage I wanted, and I could afford.
The government took that choice away from me. This pediatric dental coverage sucks, but I LITERALLY cannot vote with my feet.
Obamacare sent a wrecking ball through anyone unsubsidized on an individual policy, such as small business owners, like me.
He must really despise small business owners to do this to us. Because there is NO WAY the middle class can stay in the middle class with this.
I have to laugh, thinking back how people howled with rage at a payroll tax that was something like $25/month. The silly sheep voted for something that caused hikes of many thousands of dollars a year for the middle class.
Anyone who likes Obamacare must either not have it, or be subsidized. Anyone who pays full price, who had insurance before, thinks that it’s expensive and the coverage is bad.
And, to forestall you from saying I’m making all this up, just go to GOOGLE and search on premium increases under Obamacare. Or just call any of the major insurance companies and ask them how premiums changed under Obamacare.
david, Unfortunately you don’t get your valuable time back responding to vapidity from people w/ nothing but time. C’est la vie.
He’s probably a govt. employee. NTTAWWT!!
I was an S Corp for 22 years when I ran my agency. I was a sole prop prior to that. I found the biggest advantage w/ the S Corp status being liability protection. Thankfully, I was never sued or had a work comp claim.
DBQ wrote: “As a small business owner, under a Sub Chapter S Corp structure…”
Thanks for responding to that remark. I rolled my eyes so much, that when about to respond, I thought, nah, what’s the use. He probably doesn’t even understand the difference between an S corp and a C corp, and I’m not going to hold his hand through this. People with a liberal bent spend so much time demonizing corporations they have no idea what a corporation is or how they pay taxes. Heck, we also are made into tax collectors by the government, and not by choice. It deceives the public into thinking that the business takes the money from them and the government gives it back to them!
We Reserve The Right To Refuse Gay Cakes To Anyone. (period)
We Reserve The Right To Refuse Straight Cakes To Any Jake.
Pardon my skipping to the end.
Public accommodation was intended to cover places that could accommodate you like restaurants and hotels. Not extras like bakeries and photographers.
What the federal government is allowed to shoehorn under a Constitution that was never intended to cover is criminal.
If I had a business dealing with weddings I’d tell them I was booked or out of town. You can discuss the cake prior to deciding. It’s a game, but I don’t like anybody being forced to do something they don’t want to do, period.
Does the right to assemble also mean right not to assemble?
Gay activists have messed up gays who don’t want all this brouhaha. Bakeries having no problem with gays should be frequented. And there are gay people and gay people. Some of these weddings look like the city zoo. I don’t care if you are gay. I don’t want to know what you are. You are a human being. That’s it!
The government is too much in our lives. Take your tax money and go!
Also, instead of deciding everyone should go to college free, we should recognize the changes in our economy. Young people should have some counseling at the beginning of high school about what interests them. I had a friend who wanted to be a nurse since she was 10. There were so many wasted hours in classes that had nothing about nursing.
Math has completely changed. We simply use machines. Why are we teaching algebra to someone who doesn’t need it for their future career? And if they aren’t good at it, they won’t be better at Trig. In addition to engineers, we need plumbers, mechanics, electricians.
College isn’t for everyone and community college is just a two-year extension of high school. What about physical skills? If a young girl is a good dancer, teach her more of that instead of gym or art.
Why can’t educators think outside the box? Isn’t the goal to graduate a productive person? How about interning in summer for credit? Work with a plumbing company or electrical company.
I like pay to read. Why not? If someone who doesn’t like reading is given two or three really good books, he’ll learn why we read. The optimal time to teach reading is four. Why are we waiting until six?
Yes, I’m on my bandwagon. Obama wants more money for education. I want more bang for my buck. Why did my parents go to parent night? Not because it was required. But apparently lots of parents should. So make a law. We’ve got thousands of them, why not one more?
These are our kids. They have to run this place someday. Not learning is bad for all of us. No plumbers, no electricians and we are toast (uncooked).
If he doesn’t wear his watch or wedding ring tonight, he’s Muslim, true?
What a bunch of hooey!
Even if it is true I don’t accept your premise. What if it was an incestous couple that had a child in their school? Is that religious school required to have people who violate every tenet of their faith be a part of their community? How about a Nazi family? Would a black churches school have to accept them? Or is it only certain special groups?
Would you require a Madrassa accept Jewish families?
I didn’t think so. You liberals won’t even force them to accept a cartoon.
Lesson from the NHS:
“