Colorado baker Jack Phillips won an incredible victory at the Supreme Court Monday morning in a 7-2 decision that really should have been 9-0 like most constitutional cases, unless politics and activism get in the way. Despite the Supreme Court’s unnecessarily narrow holding and a blatant invitation from Justice Anthony Kennedy for future litigants to submit the same controversy with different, less obviously biased facts, this case is still a significant win for conservatives in Colorado and other states with similarly hostile government commissions with the power to adjudicate claims of discrimination in public accommodations.

I’ve written previously about the overt animus and bias displayed by the Colorado Civil Rights Commission in particular, and those of us who read the oral argument transcript predicted a narrow win for Jack Phillips, but hoped the Supreme Court would draw a more broad and firm limiting principle and protect religious liberty.