Progressive protesterONE day after releasing their final rulings of the term, the justices of the Supreme Court returned for an encore on June 28th. The occasion was an event that occurs roughly 7,000 times each year and normally turns few heads: a refusal to hear a case. But in the matter of Stormans v Wiesman, the justices’ “no thanks” was accompanied by a rare and sharp dissent from the court’s three most conservative members. Writing for John Roberts (the chief justice) and Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito warned that the denial was “ominous”. If the court’s refusal to take up Stormans “is a sign of how religious liberty claims will be treated in the years ahead,” Mr Alito wrote, “those who value religious freedom have cause for great concern.”
The plaintiffs in Stormans are the devout Christian owners of Ralph’s Thriftway, a grocery and pharmacy in Olympia, Washington. The Stormans family, along with two other pharmacists, brought a lawsuit in 2007 when Washington beefed up its rule requiring pharmacies to fulfil prescriptions for...Continue reading
Source: United States http://ift.tt/29C6EKU
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