New Mexico Assaults Religious Liberty

New Mexico Court of Appeals 

National Review Online - When 43 Catholic dioceses, schools, and institutions filed suit against the Obama administration to block the HHS mandate, they reiterated for all Americans the importance of preserving “our first, most cherished liberty”: religious liberty, as guaranteed in the First Amendment. But while national attention lingers on that specific clash, fresh assaults on religious liberty carry on elsewhere. The latest battleground is New Mexico. In 2008, the New Mexico Human Rights Commission found Elane Photography, an Albuquerque photography studio co-owned by Elaine Huguenin and her husband, Jonathan, guilty of discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation for refusing to photograph Vanessa Willock’s same-sex “commitment ceremony.” The court ordered the business to pay $6,600 in attorney’s fees. If it was little surprise that the commission found in favor of Willock, it was a shock when, last month, the New Mexico Court of Appeals upheld the ruling. The three-judge panel rejected Elane Photography’s claim that forcing the business to photograph the same-sex ceremony against its conscientious objections constituted “compelled speech” in violation of the owners’ federal and state rights. It also rejected the Huguenins’ claims to protection under the First Amendment’s “free exercise” clause and the New Mexico Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Read More News New Mexico

New Mexico Assaults Religious Liberty