WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear
closely watched cases on gay rights, campaign finance and lethal
injections. As is their custom, the justices gave no reasons for turning
down the appeals.
The
gay rights case, Elane Photography v. Willock, No. 13-585, was an
appeal from a wedding photographer in New Mexico who asserted a
constitutional right to refuse to provide her services to gay and
lesbian couples.
The issue was broadly similar to one argued before the court last month,
over whether companies may refuse to provide insurance coverage for
contraception on religious grounds. But the New Mexico case was based
not on a claim of religious liberty but on one of free speech.
The
photographer, Elaine Huguenin, objected to a New Mexico law prohibiting
businesses open to the public from discriminating against gay men and
lesbians. She said that requiring her to photograph same-sex weddings
violated her First Amendment rights because she was forced to say
something she did not believe.
She
rejected a request from Vanessa Willock and Misti Collinsworth to
document their commitment ceremony. The women, who hired another
photographer, filed a discrimination complaint against Ms. Huguenin’s
studio, Elane Photography.
The New Mexico Supreme Court ruled
for the couple, saying Ms. Huguenin’s “services can be regulated, even
though those services include artistic and creative work.” Laws banning
discrimination, the court said, apply to “creative or expressive
professions.”
Justice Richard C. Bosson issued an ambivalent concurrence expressing sympathy for Ms. Huguenin and her husband.
“The
Huguenins are not trying to prohibit anyone from marrying,” he wrote.
“They only want to be left alone to conduct their photography business
in a manner consistent with their moral convictions.” Instead, they “are
compelled by law to compromise the very religious beliefs that inspire
their lives,” he added.
“Though the rule of law requires it,” Justice Bosson wrote, “the result is sobering.”
The
justices also declined to hear a campaign finance case, Iowa Right to
Life Committee v. Tooker, No. 13-407, which was a challenge to an Iowa
law that bans contributions from corporations but allows them from
unions. The case was brought by James Bopp Jr., one of the lawyers on
the winning side on Wednesday in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, a major campaign finance case.
The McCutcheon decision struck down aggregate contribution limits in federal elections.
Mr.
Bopp challenged the Iowa law on two grounds. He said distinguishing
between corporations and unions violated equal protection principles. In
any event, he added, “banning corporate political contributions
violates the First Amendment.”
The
Supreme Court also declined to hear two cases concerning whether death
row inmates have a constitutional right to know what chemicals states
plan to use to execute them.
The
challenges said the court’s attention was needed to bring order to a
capital justice system in disarray. Drug shortages and boycotts have
caused prisons to scramble to find lethal chemicals, raising what
opponents of the death penalty say is the possibility of executions so
painful that they violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and
unusual punishment.
In January, executions in two states seemed to go awry. An Oklahoma inmate’s last words,
12 seconds after he was injected with lethal chemicals, were: “I feel
my whole body burning.” A week later, an Ohio inmate “struggled, made
guttural noises, gasped for air and choked for about 10 minutes before
succumbing to a new, two-drug execution method,” according to The Columbus Dispatch.
One
case, Sepulvado v. Jindal, No. 13-892, concerned Christopher Sepulvado,
who was convicted of scalding and beating his 6-year-old stepson to
death. Mr. Sepulvado’s lawyers asked the Supreme Court to decide whether due process “entitles a condemned inmate with timely notice of the method by which he will be executed.”
A second case, Zink v. Lombardi, No. 13-8435, was brought by death row inmates in Missouri. It asked
the justices to review an appeals court decision that required them to
specify an acceptable form of execution in order to challenge the one
that the state intended to employ.
Correction: April 7, 2014
An earlier version of this article misstated the name of the agency involved in the McCutcheon case decided last week by the Supreme Court. It is the Federal Election Commission, not the Federal Election Committee.
An earlier version of this article misstated the name of the agency involved in the McCutcheon case decided last week by the Supreme Court. It is the Federal Election Commission, not the Federal Election Committee.
A version of this article appears in print on April 8, 2014, on page A13 of the New York edition with the headline: Justices Won’t Hear An Appeal On Gay Bias .
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