The Rev. Franklin Graham responded to Monday’s Supreme Court ruling that extends employment protections to gay and transgender people by arguing the court overstepped its authority and made law rather than interpreting it.
The highest court in the land ruled Monday by a margin of 6-3 that employers who fire workers for being gay or transgender are violating Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
“Today the U.S. Supreme Court enacted a new law that adds sexual orientation and gender identity to the 1964 Civil Rights Act as ‘protected classes,’” the Christian leader posted on Facebook with a link to a Rolling Stone column titled, “Supreme Court’s Landmark LGBTQ Employment Decision Is Even Bigger Than Marriage Equality.”
Graham agreed with Justice Samuel Alito’s dissent that the “majority went too far” in what amounted to a “brazen abuse of our authority.”
“The Supreme Court exists to interpret the law, not to make new laws — making laws is the job of our Representatives in Congress, elected by the people,” Graham wrote.
Graham continued: “I believe this decision erodes religious freedoms across this country. People of sincere faith who stand on God’s Word as their foundation for life should never be forced by the government to compromise their religious beliefs. Christian organizations should never be forced to hire people who do not align with their biblical beliefs and should not be prevented from terminating a person whose lifestyle and beliefs undermine the ministry’s purpose and goals.”
Many conservatives have joined Graham’s criticism of the ruling, specifically the majority opinion written by Trump appointee Justice Neil Gorsuch, arguing that Title VII did not ban employment discrimination based on sexual preference or sexual identity, and the judges who voted in the majority were making new law and not interpreting it.
“In February, I tweeted what was already a rapidly circulating rumor that Neil Gorsuch would side with the liberals in reading sexual orientation and transgenderism into Title VII,” syndicated columnist Josh Hammer tweeted following the ruling. “On Monday, he did precisely that. It is a bastardization of textualism.”
In February, I tweeted what was already a rapidly circulating rumor that Neil Gorsuch would side with the liberals in reading sexual orientation and transgenderism into Title VII.
On Monday, he did precisely that. It is a bastardization of textualism. https://t.co/PiiLx1KpY9
— Josh Hammer (@josh_hammer) June 16, 2020
Hammer wrote a piece in the New York Post that argued when the 1964 Civil Rights Act opposed discrimination based on “sex,” it meant biological sex and not orientation or “subjective gender identity,” which echoed Alito’s dissent.
“Religious employers’ conscience rights aside, long-settled employment law has now been thrown into chaos,” Hammer wrote. “The court concedes that such issues as sex-specific bathrooms, locker rooms and sports teams will be on the chopping block in future litigation. As my former boss, Judge James C. Ho of the Fifth Circuit, noted in a similar case last year, the underlying legal issues ’affect every American who uses the restroom at any restaurant, buys clothes at any department store or exercises at any gym.’”
The Wall Street Journal editorial board appeared to agree with Hammer’s conclusion, calling the decision a big victory for Justice Elena Kagan and concluding the majority had rewritten the Civil Rights Act rather than interpreting it.
“I’ve read the decision, and some people were surprised,” President Trump said. “But they’ve ruled, and we live with their decision.”
“That’s what it’s all about,” he said. “We live with the decision of the Supreme Court.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi released a statement describing the “momentous” decision as “a victory for the LGBTQ community, for our democracy and for our fundamental values of equality and justice for all.”
