The U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on Monday regarding a Denver-area website designer subject to a Colorado state law that censors and coerces the speech of creative professionals whose religious beliefs do not conform to state accepted beliefs.
Liberty Counsel filed an amicus brief to the High Court in 303 Creative v. Elenis in support of the free speech of Colorado native Lorie Smith.Senior Counsel for Governmental Affairs Jonathan Alexandre will speak at the rally in front of the Supreme Court steps at 9:30 a.m. before the oral arguments.
Smith creates unique and beautiful websites for her clients and started her business in 2012 to exercise creative freedom. Smith serves everyone but cannot use her design skills and creativity to express messages that violate her deeply held religious beliefs. However, under Colorado’s Anti-Discrimination Act, Smith could be punished simply for offering to create websites only celebrating weddings consistent with her beliefs that marriage is between one man and one woman.
In addition, the law acts as a gag order that prevents Smith from expressing on her website the reasons why she only creates messages celebrating certain ideas. Ironically, Colorado’s public-accommodation law allows secular artists but not religious ones like Smith to make “message-based refusals.”
Smith filed a lawsuit in 2016 in federal court. Nearly three years later, a judge issued a final ruling allowing Colorado officials to force Smith to design and publish websites promoting messages that conflict with her religious beliefs. In July 2021, the Court of Appeals ruled the state can force an artist to create expressive content, even if that speech violates their faith. Continue reading…
