I'm confused. I'm just trying to figure out what you meant by with this exchange:
SCOTUS makes correct ruling on Colorado baker...
- Thread starter Steven15
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I'm confused. I'm just trying to figure out what you meant by with this exchange:
If the baker accidentally uses Chocolate, and the dogs die, is it considered a hate crime?
^ this is what made it such a interesting case. The baker didn’t deny them service. They were more than welcome to purchase any of his pre-made cakes, he denied creating them a cake (bakery=art, form of speech protected under 1A) b cause it was against his religion.
Fascinating ...... and if Im understanding the Courts findings ..... they really didn’t answer the question that the people really wanted to know....... they kind of skirted around the issue ... smart by them IMo, but this will come up again
Can you show me in the Bible where Jesus refuses to repeatedly serve the sinners amongst him?
I know this falls under the scope of upholding freedom of religion, but with this instance being subject to a Christian based decision of the part of the Baker, i’d argue this ruling from a Christian perspective is a ruling that is freedom from religion.
A lot of Christians are walking a very twisted line with singling out homo sexuals. Let’s call it a real inarguable sin (even though Jesus never really speaks of it), because everything we do is inarguably sinful. Some Christians are still stuck trying to earn salvation through some sort of moral hierarchy of sin. And homosexuality tops the list even though it’s significance is no different than a heterosexual lusting/coveting over attractive females or males. But lots of Christians can emphatically say they are free of the homosexuality sin. One of the very few that you are either committing or not committing. No wondering there, no gray area there. No inner turmoil that leads one to justify that you only sinned just a little bit, so only 1/4 guilty. so it makes them feel better about themselves. A gay person is 100% convicted.
I wonder if the baker would have denied an atheists request for a cake for a wedding celebration? Or denied the couple who is getting remarried after their first marriages failed due to adultery? My guess is probably not. Those are ‘forgivable’. Not homsexuality.
But to the freedom ‘from’ religion thing. Before Jesus scarficed himself for all of our sins, he knew he was about to be denied by his closest of disciples, Peter. He was about to be fully betrayed by another disciple, Judas. Both, if we are keeping earthly score, could be be considered categorically more catastrophic sins to Jesus and God than being homosexual. Yet, the night before, instead of condemning them, he shared the same room with them, ate dinner with them and washed their feet. Symbolically cleaning them of their earthly stains. At the time, it was considered the ultimate form of servitude.
So If all Christians claim that they love Jesus for what he’s done for us, the irony is that we still act contrary his very life of serving the lowest of the low. Denying a service based on a Christian religious belief is the exact opposite of what Jesus, our savior we worship, did. It is in conflict with his gospel ministry.
It’s not an acceptance of sin. It’s an acknowledgment of the tragedy of sin. So you could argue, from a Christian perspective, we might actually need a law telling us how we should treat people if Christianity is the sole basis for such a decision as the baker’s.
I’m not touching on it lawfully, i’m Speaking on behalf of the ‘win for Christianity’. Refusal to serve someone because of sexual orientation seems bigoted to me, and i don’t know how it can be anything other than that. But there are Many Christians that really enjoy lumping it in as a ‘religious belief’ to cover the bias. It’s the crutch of all crutches.
I get it. Not sure anyone can be fully free of degrees of bigotry or bias. That’s the depth to which we suck as a people. the far left agenda is searching for an agenda that we as people are incapable of achieving. The far right Christian agenda is one that is in stark contrast to the God in which they claim to serve.
It’s why Christians believe and serve in a savior, Jesus. Because his life, death and most importantly, resurrection, freely gives us a salvation that we are incapable of achieving. Whether homosexual, adulterer, a failure in loving our neighbor as ourself, loving our god with all our heart, mind and soul, etc.
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If I found a Christian who disagreed with SCOTUS would you magically change your mind?
Lol that you don't realize the SCOTUS just tucked the issue under the rug for another day. This decision does not set precedence. Not that you would understand that.
So you are arguing that the first ammendment protects certain religious extremists rights to blow sh!t up? I thought the first was fairly well outlined. Learn something new everyday.
No, I'm stating there are clearly limits on what behaviors are protected by the first amendment. To my mind the 1st Amendment (as it pertains to religious freedoms) only protects you from discrimination on the basis of your religion. It should grant a very limited amount of special treatment (eg I'm ok with prisoners being served food that adheres to their religion but people should not be allowed to discriminate on the basis of their religion in their public lives).
Interestingly, this case was not an argument about religious freedom (until SCOTUS ruled that Phillips was denied due process by Colorado) but about compelling speech. To me, there was no compelled speech conflict with Colorado's law because the baker was not being forced to bake a cake that says "I love gays - Phillips", he was asked to create the same cake he'd make for anyone else. That's discrimination and should not be protected under the 1st Amendment.
There are 2 posts, in the whole thread, that indicated an understanding of what is going on.
The court didn't decide that the baker could refuse service to a gay couple. They determined that the Colorado Civil Rights Commission's decision was improper because of a stated animus towards religion.
The court didn't decide that the baker could refuse service to a gay couple. They determined that the Colorado Civil Rights Commission's decision was improper because of a stated animus towards religion.
It was sad to read this thread and notice only a few posts had it right. SCOTUS just kicked the can down the road.
your gay maga friend is off-topic. The court didnt rule what he/you seem to think it did.
Here are some interesting quotes from Gorsuchs opinion.
"Maybe most notably, the Commission allowed three other bakers to refuse a customer's request that would have required them to violate their secular commitments. Yet it denied the same accommodation to Mr. Phillips when he refused a customer's request that would have required him to violate his religious beliefs."
Gorsuch used the example of Jack's cases versus Phillips' case to argue that Ginsburg and Sotomayor were wrong in their dissent, and Kagan and Breyer were wrong to say, in their concurrence, Colorado could've infringed upon Phillips' religious freedom if it wasn't hostile to Phillips' religious belief.
"The facts show that the two cases share all legally salient features. In both cases, the effect on the customer was the same: bakers refused service to persons who bore a statutorily protected trait (religious faith or sexual orientation). But in both cases the bakers refused service intending only to honor a personal conviction. ... In both cases, it was the kind of cake, not the kind of customer, that mattered to the bakers."
Interesting. I feel like that's pretty disingenuous of Gorsuch.
Source
Those bakers likely would not have made a cake with homophobic messages for anyone, regardless of religion. My understanding is that Phillips refused outright to discuss making a cake for the gay couple. If they had wanted a cake identical to a cake that a straight couple had requested then he should have made it. The couple did not request for the cake to bear any sort of written statement. I do not think that Phillips should have been compelled to provide a service that he would not have provided for anyone else (eg a cake with explicit promo homosexual language). To say that making the cake for a service that you don't personally support should be protected sets really bad precedent, in my opinion.
I don't count any.
The whole process of a "Supreme Court" ruling over private business (State control, if any) contracts is 100% unconstitutional.
No, not the US federal court. Maybe a federal court for another country it does, not sure.
Do you know what the word "jurisdiction" means? Because I can't tell if you are being serious.
Ive got a pretty good understanding of what jurisdiction means.
Back to you though:
If a federal court never has jurisdiction over a person, what kinds of cases can they hear? Why do they exist?
I am constantly amazed at how, despite the effort you clearly put into forming your thoughts, you are consistently wrong.
Well I have to wholeheartedly disagree with your first comment in order to answer the second.
A federal court, otherwise known as the Judicial branch of government, by law, has the least amount of power by design. In other words, there was no way the Constitution was going to be ratified by the States if a group of old men had “authority” over the citizenry. Great Britain ruled this way with the King periodically “correcting” the courts. So no, absolutely not, do federal courts hold jurisdiction over people, that power resides with and only with the Legislative Branch (the branch of government that is supposed to make ALL laws), period.
Reply to this (if you want) and we can move on.
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I am wrong that the Supreme Court has no authority to interpret the law, otherwise known as the Constitution? Point to it! Give me the Article in which this authority exists.
Also, as i mentioned (State control) above, the power resides in the State of Colorado. Colorado has Constitutional authority to tell the federal government to mind its own business. Amaze yourself as to why you can’t find this authority and then come back and tell me who is wrong.
You can sit there and smugly think that you're the only person who has truly figured out the Constitution and I'll cede to 250 years of precedent and reality, thanks. Even if you were right it wouldn't matter. The facts are:
1) Federal courts have power
2) The government has the power to tax income
EVEN IF you were somehow (unlikely) correct on your interpretation of the Constitution and dozens of congressional approved Supreme Court Justices were somehow blathering idiots this entire time, your opinion on the matter isn't going to change the tangible power the federal government actually has.
So you get pissed at me because you can’t find anything to prove otherwise, which by the way, you started this whole thing when you said I was “wrong”? Now I am sitting here “smugly”? Very immature comment.
I’m not the only one by the way, there are other people who know the SCOTUS has no “original jurisdiction” (look it up) over people.
1) Federal courts ONLY have the power granted to them by the States/Legislative Branch (look it up), nothing more and nothing less. Colorado has authority, no different from Arizona over immigration laws.
2) If you could explain to me why it was held, under law, that taxing wages (not income, two different references in the Constitution) was unconstitutional, but yet suddenly it isn’t now, maybe we could get somewhere on this topic. But you won’t, so what’s the point of your #2? Just taking a low blow?
And just to reiterate, the “tangible” power of the federal government was enumerated to them by, again, the States. So the power you think (and Supreme Court Justices) they have only meets what the legislative body gave them and nothing more. Why does Article I (Legislative) come before Article III (Judicial)? Which is Constitutionally held in higher regard?
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If I go through the Constitution and try and point out the various ways that the Supreme Court has power or that the Federal Government has power to levy income tax through the 16th amendment, are you or are you not going to say I'm wrong because words like "income" or "jurisdiction" actually have a meaning that's different from the dictionary and how I really just don't understand what those words mean but you do and you assure me that you're right?
The irony of this discussion is you are also correct (by what actually happens today) on basically both fronts, SCOTUS and government taxation. The question(s), or where I am trying to steer this conversation is, is it legal according to the Constitution, or what we all consider as Americans, the law of our land? As you know, the Government does MANY things, in many different departments, but are they all legal?
The Framers were very deliberate in word usage, the intent had to be explicit, NOT debatable. If you go through the Constitution, there is NO explicit authority for the Supreme Court (Judicial Branch) to "review" the Constitution or as we commonly say today, "interpret" the Constitution. Think about it this way, if the Supreme Court is Federal, and the Federal Government created the Supreme Court, do you really think the Framers would give the Supreme Court ( a handful of men) the power to basically "interpret" the meaning of itself? There is absolutely no way, this is no different from the Kings court in Great Britain, the very country we fought to release ourselves from, are we to say we set up the Constitution to "rule" in the exact same manner? Short answer, hell no.
As far as taxation, an income tax is legal, if applied as the Constitution says. But first, what is "income"? If you look up what the meaning was from Blacks the very year the 16th Amendment was passed, it said "income may be defined as the gains derived from capital, from labor, or from both combined, combined operations and here we have of capital and labor." Id at p. 415". So what are "gains"? Gains are the profits you earned. So income = profits, something a business/corporation would make. So it is legal in the Constitution for the government to tax a business/corporation, i.e. our business is legally taxed on its income because we make a profit. So the question you should ask yourself is, is a person getting paid a wage the same thing as making a profit? Short answer, no.
I never considered this an argument, I don't come on TI to "argue" with people. I will always apologize if it comes off that way because arguing implies a heated exchange and that's not my cup of tea.
I didn't mean to imply that your tenor was out of line. I mean argue from the first definition: "give reasons or cite evidence in support of an idea, action, or theory, typically with the aim of persuading others to share one's view." I was saying that I was pleased that I anticipated the sort of argument you made. I'm not pleased with the argument itself because it's a semantic rabbit hole. I doubt there's much I can do to convince you on everything if you reject the common definition income ("money received, especially on a regular basis, for work or through investments."). I find it implausible that we passed an amendment that wasn't worded correctly for the very thing they were trying to accomplish (an income tax as we currently understand it) AND that everyone just let it slide.
Edit: Also,
That line about "arising under this constitution, the laws of the United States, AND treaties made" sure seems to grant the court jurisdiction over Constitutional issues as well as the laws of the United States.
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As I mentioned previously, you are correct in the current action(s) taken by courts or the enforcement of "laws". This is obvious, because I pay a tax with every check I receive, there is no denying this fact. When I turn on the TV or computer, you can find where the Supreme Court is constantly "interpreting" the Constitution as they see fit. I can't deny this fact either. Nothing you are saying to me is wrong with respect to what is happening on a daily/weekly/monthly or even yearly basis.
This is not a semantic discussion, its a discussion over government, more specifically Federal government overreach. When I made the comment earlier about the Framers using words for explicit meaning, the meaning of these words have been construed into today's vocabulary. In other words, a word like income had an explicit meaning during the ratified Constitution time frame and today can have several different definitions, such as what you said above. Think about it like this, why did a tax on income, for well over 100 years, not apply to people? Why was it unconstitutional? Am I just making all of this up? No, it didn't apply to people because the word income was not used nor defined like you or the majority of people define it today. You must agree, if a law is made using a specific word during a specific time frame, the law is written to contain within it the meaning of each word during that time frame. You and I can't deny that fact. As I mentioned previously, income = profits, it is impossible for a person to make a profit, we can only get paid a wage, and the Supreme Court upheld this ruling until AFTER the 16th Amendment, mysteriously about the same time the IRS came into existence did the Supreme Court start to allow taxation on wages and the word income became synonymous with wage.
I never said the Supreme Court couldn't deal with Constitutional issues, they just don't have the explicit authority to interpret (change the meaning as mentioned above) the Constitution, there is a big difference.
