Court Rules Against Bed and Breakfast Owner Who Turned Away Lesbians

The U.S. Supreme Court handed a defeat on Monday to a bed and breakfast owner in Hawaii who turned away a lesbian couple due to her Christian beliefs, but it could soon take up another major case on the conflict between gay and religious rights.

The justices refused to hear an appeal by Phyllis Young, who runs the three-room Aloha Bed & Breakfast in Honolulu, of a lower court’s ruling that she violated a Hawaii anti-discrimination law by refusing to rent a room to Diane Cervilli and Taeko Bufford in 2007.

A state court ruled that Young ran afoul of Hawaii’s public accommodation law, which among other things bars discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Litigation will now continue to determine what penalty Young might face.

The Supreme Court’s action came nine months after it sided on very narrow grounds with a Colorado baker who refused to make a wedding cake for two men, citing his Christian beliefs. The justices could decide as soon as next week whether to take up a strikingly similar case from Oregon in which a bakery refused to make a wedding cake for a lesbian couple for religious reasons. . .

Young, who is Catholic, said her decision to turn away Cervilli and Bufford was protected by her right to free exercise of religion under the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment. Young also argued that Hawaii did not give her fair notice that her business was covered by the public accommodation law. (Read more from “Court Rules Against Bed and Breakfast Owner Who Turned Away Lesbians” HERE)

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