My wife is a licensed attorney and oversees "sworn documents" and bankruptcy compliance for one of the largest banks in the U.S. I showed her this video and she could just shake her head. The attorney that signed the sworn statement for the Court when they were electronically uploaded should catch hell over this.
Why should you catch hell for this? I work for clients from time to time and, aside from a few phone calls, have communicated electronically exclusively. The communication and data I produce/collect is absolutely admissible in court. Form submissions are no different. The “veracity” of EVERYTHING is a complicated ontological and epistemological question, even when calibrated scientific equipment is used to produce it. What matters here isn’t whether the content of the form submission was true and/or a troll. As Steve says, what matters is whether the form submission was submitted; it was unnecessary too, lol. This is nothing more than idiots getting pissy because they’re idiots and did idiot things like make bogus assumptions.
I don't see how the attorney didn't act in good faith. Electronic documents fly all around. The designer received a request and thought it was valid. So the attorney would assume the electronic doc was valid too. There is no need or requirement to swim back against the current and check it out with the purported originator, is there?
@@TimeSurfer206 No they didn't. The form submission was received after the complaint was filed, It wasn't in and of itself part of the complaint. The form was not being submitted to the court as evidence of the truth of it contents but as an example of the type of request in question. What was sworn to was effectively: "We received this form, containing these details and a request of this nature." That the details the form contained turned out to be false is largely irrelevant as it was not being presented as evidence that those details were true.
@@MeredithPutvincould it be that we ,the people, put a stop to the crazyness in govt? When the criminals in govt. start putting crazy fakes into circultion then we need to do something!
@@thomastolbert6184 I am in a straight up blue state. Even my Congress Critters and local officials. One of my Reps is Minority Whip Clark To be fair, I do not blind just vote blue in the Primary. I do look at platforms and record. In the general, I refuse to give Conspiracy Nutjobs my vote... This includes RFK, Jr. And his cousin was my district rep before trying to unseat Markey.
@@MeredithPutvin the hilarious thing about your comment is you legitimately think your team doesn't act the same way. You are everything wrong with America
Neither party in the case made "Stewart" a key witness. It seems that both parties wanted this case to be heard by the appellate courts and neither was interested in actual facts.
The same reason the Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett all became bold faced liars when they promised never to overturn Roe v Wade based on established precedent. They LIED to the entire United States of America.
@@goldenalt3166 Part of that was the nature of this complaint. This was a pre-enforcement challenge, so the fact that a request was made may have been helpful but not necessary to plead the injury.
Just so you know I'm OK with your opinion on this video, but the main reason I like your videos is because you are very good at presenting facts and not dilute things with your opinions. You stick to what the law's are and present the facts of both sides. Thank you for your time and effort to make great content.
Someone at CNN was probably monitoring filings for anything related to the new law, and sent a request, to see if they could come up with a juicy Fake News story.
Not a single entity has proven that a single thing about the request was "fake." If they have, please provide the evidence. And no, what the guy whose name was on the request tells a reporter 8 years later is not proof - in any court.
@@originalbluebuddha It's not proof, but it _is_ a reason to check. Have you checked? Do you even know how to check? Most people likely haven't because it costs money to even see what they submitted in the original case. But you know what's suspicious? ADF Legal made no reference to anything related to the methods one would use to validate that an email is legitimate, instead choosing to attack the people asking and deflect to other topics. So the claim that "no entity has proven a single thing about the request was fake" is disingenuous - it appears nobody has checked, and likely the means to check were not included in what was submitted. But hey, I have a fully grown live adult elephant in my bedroom closet. Prove I don't.
Thanks Steve. I appreciate your insight and expertise. Don’t worry about negative comments. There are a lot of people who are more than happy to share their uninformed opinions. You do good work.
@StevenWood1210 Attorneys do almost nothing else BUT give their opinions and the nature of the system is dispute between parties who rarely actually agree, even after a court issues a ruling. I don't suffer them either, but I disagree with the idea that giving one's opinion won't change anyone's mind. Making the case for a Constitutionally based opinion might not make your opponent like it, but it can generate understanding and respect.
I do like that you keep things factual. I'm incredibly politically plugged in and I like getting big news like this without the emotionally charged wording, it makes the facts clear from a legal perspective, which is usually missing from what I see.
This video can be summed up with "It was a pre-enforcement challenge to an unconstitutional law, which was overturned." It's actually unconstitutional for a state to even MAKE a law that violates your right to free speech (let alone, attempt to enforce that law).
Most of the people in the comments of this video and the last video, have no ability whatsoever to think for themselves. They get led around by the nose by Fake News, daily.
Sounds like the sort of thing flat earthers and other science deniers say all the time. It's always good to remain skeptical but needs to be balanced. Perspective needs to be applied. In the vast majority of cases, William of Ockham's (Occan's razor) approach is the correct one.
I actually like that steve avoids political stuff. Sure its fun listening to him talk about SCOTUS cases, but people are crazy and hed get too much drama.
Apparently, with some folks, the concept of free speech is also now a political matter and the government now has "rights" to tell private parties to squelch it on behalf of the ruling party... unless of course, we are talking about doing it to the OTHER party. Is free speech, therefore now, political? If so, anything can qualify as political so long as there is someone who makes it political. There are Constitutional matters here including the rights of speech and association.
@@Papadoc1000 imagine believing that scotus isn't biased, partisan and for sale... regardless of the facts in this case. the entire appointment process is dubious from front to back, lets look at who selects these judges, partisan 'think tanks' handpick individuals they groomed for the job. when one can look at who appointed which judge and reliably predict how they will vote on any given case, then its not law or justice, its whomever has enough money to groom and push forward their 'people' for the job.
@@paladroou can read their rulings and easily tell who writes logically and who writes overemotional gobbledygook. The dissent in this one was absurd. Also interesting that people want to blame the conservatives for partisanship when the three liberal justices also never break ranks in political cases. This one should have been a cut and dry 9-0 Opinion but instead the three progressive justices doubled down on their belief that the government has a right to mandate speech.
I’m no lawyer but it surprises me that any documents used in a case that there isn’t a record of who submitted it and who received it and that anything submitted to the court isn’t vetted. If a lawyer submitted the documents without confirming where they came from and that they’re not fake, I could only point at them for manufacturing them.
So let’s see…” I received this request” We need to vet it..”OK, here is the email I received” What more is the plaintiff required to do if they aren’t using the document?
Since this was a form the only information they would have is the information in the form. It wouldn't have all the header information from an email sender. If they don't log the IP of the submitter due to an abundance of caution for ridiculous data privacy concerns then that's all the data they would have is that which is contained within the form. Blame GDPR and CCPA for the lack of the information you want. It's simpler to just treat everyone like the most paranoid law than carve things out and hope you got it right.
It may seem surprising to you, but this is standard practice. If you knew how common it was, you might lose all faith in the judicial system. It is far too common that a lawyer, specifically a prosecutor, just says, "Oopsie poopsie. I accidentally fabricated a bunch of evidence. I pwomise it was an accident." Just look at two of the highest profile trials recently; Kyle Rittenhouse and Johnny Depp. In the Rittenhouse trial, the prosecutor deliberately fabricated evidence and then outright lied to the judge about it. In the Depp trial, Heard's lawyer showed two identical pictures and tried to say they were different pictures taken on different days. And the judge just accepts it. There aren't any real repercussions for lying in court or fabricating evidence, especially if it is the state fabricating evidence. As long as someone says, "I didn't mean to lie," then they get away with it.
I was a little surprised that it wasn’t vetted. I would think that’s why you have one of your clerks making phone calls. But in the end, it really wasn’t needed for the case. It’s kind of like having a 10 pound wedding cake and then adding a sprinkle on top of it. You didn’t really need the sugar in that sprinkle to make it a high sugar dessert. (And yes, I did use a wedding cake on purpose. )
TBH, he's an attorney and I'm sure he's used to people being very angry at him. Not that it really makes it OK, but it is common for one litigant or another to be very angry at the attorneys involved when they don't like the outcome.
His opening remarks about that brought to mind his video about the Aussie chef who banned veg heads and the suspect “reviews” he dealt with about his choice.
even as a lay person I know that part of the responsibility of the lawyers is to do their due diligence to any paperwork submitted by their client in order to ensure it is authentic as such a discovery during the trial would be devastating to their case, it is also their responsibility to check the paperwork submitted by the opposing side, this is why legal fees are so expensive since lawyers usually don't do all of that work, they usually hire someone to check all of that for them.
You kind of have it backwards. It is on the opposing party to show due diligence and discover if the other party is lying. If you lose a court case due to a lie by the other party and only learn it was a lie after the trial, the judge will say, "Tough shit. You should have brought that up before the trial was over." A lawyer had a duty of candor to the court. They aren't allowed to knowingly and intentionally lie. And good luck proving it was intentional. Even if you do, that won't change the trial. They lying is considered a separate issue with a separate disciplinary actions.
@@malcanth3481 Doubt it since as an attorney you are signing any documents and presenting it as fact and acting as an officer for the courts so the onus is on the lawyer to do their research and ensure their clients paperwork is in order. Now while any lawyer worth their weight in salt should also check the paperwork of the opposing side the onus is not on them to make sure it's all above board. If you loose a court case due to a lie by the other party and only learn it was a lie after the trial there have to be an appeal done in the applet court presenting the new evidence (The false document). For example what if someone was convicted of murder and the officer testified that he found DNA evidence at the scene of the crime and it was only after the trial was over that it came to light that the officer planted the evidence, it was still a lie and you're seriously gonna sit there and say a judge is gonna say ''tough shit''?
@@malcanth3481Nope, and you should know it. A lawyer signs an affidavit that HIS documents are correct and researched. Recently some lawyers got into trouble for this because they submitted some hallucinations of GPT - and the court did not like that.
@ThomasTomiczek A lawyer signs that his documents are true and correct "to the best of his knowledge." That's why I said they can't knowingly lie. And in the hypothetical you brought up, you are talking about when new evidence is discovered. The evidence being that it was discovered the DNA was planted. That is different from when the evidence could have been easily discovered and the lawyer just didn't. I say this because lawyers get away with it ALL the time. It is the same way police always get out of trouble for lying in court. "I didn't lie. Someone else lied to me." "I didn't lie. It was just a mistake." "I didn't lie. I'm just wrong." "I didn't lie. I'm just stupid and bad at my job." If you get caught intentionally lying, yeah, you're fucked. But if you can come up with an excuse for why it wasn't a lie, it was just incorrect, then you get away with it. And lawyers are kind of experts at creating excuses for the inexcusable.
@ThomasTomiczek A lawyer signs that his documents are true and correct "to the best of his knowledge." That's why I said they can't intentionally lie. And the chat GPT thing is irrelevant to this. I guess you could say the lawyers were lying about who did the work. But that would be them getting caught knowingly lying. Which I already said would get you fucked.
Here's the problem, why would someone in California who is a web designer in their own right hire someone in Colorado to design a website who had never designed a website before ? This whole case stinks to high heaven. I hope the guy in California sues their asses off
@@tzaphkielconficturus7136 If the request came in via email, is there no forensics that could be done on it? I understand that spoofing could have been done, but some basic level of forensics on the email servers should be done to see if the sender bothered to cover their tracks.
Whether it is the case here or not - lawfare is NEVER about obtaining the service or product that is supposedly the issue. It is about grinding any dissenter with their ideology under the heels of the "justice" system.
@@tzaphkielconficturus7136 Pretty easy to determine actually. All you have to do is confirm how the request was originally submitted and work from there.
I guess you haven't seen any of his civil asset forfeiture videos. He's not neutral at all on those. Of course, that's a political cause that actually means something, rather than some divisive, manufactured, ultimately inconsequential nonsense being pushed by corporate media...
@@I.PittyTheFool Really? Is it neutral when he regularly encourages his viewers to donate to a legal fund devoted to fighting CAF, QI, etc.? I'm not, at all, saying that he's wrong to advocate for the Institute for Justice, but he's clearly not neutral on those issues. Of course, no good people are neutral about corrupt, sadistic, totalitarian policies. Those policies are pretty indefensible, so just covering them is choosing a side, as those perpetrating those crimes rely upon widespread ignorance to protect themselves. Neutral isn't the same thing as being good.
My question is, if this guy was listed on the case as the person who requested the website, why wasn't he, at a minimum, deposed or brought as a witness in the case?
Who needs evidence and facts when the sc will agree with your opinion either way? Too bad their billionaire friends don't take them on a submersible to the titanic, i heard the view is great
Because they wanted to straight up( no pun intended) lie and get all the way to the SCOTUS to set a standard and say Gay rights can be voided piece by piece.
Yeah, I was shocked that the information had been out there for some time and no one verified it from day one. From watching 4 or 5 different lawyers on this issue it seems that it is not always done in a case like this. After watching this video I understand even more now and it makes more sense now.
I had a boss try to get me to argue with an auditor. He told me you need to write an email saying he's wrong and your professional opinion is that his concerns are irrelevant to the matter. My response was that my professional opinion was that I was not qualified to make such a determination. He didn't last long.
The distinction has to be turning down custom based on identity,versus turning it down because of message. Similar issue in the Asher's Bakery case over here in the UK. Where it was held that a bakery couldn't lawfully refuse to bake a cake because a customer is gay. But they can lawfully refuse to bake a cake with a message supporting gay marriage.
That's pretty much how it is in the U.S., too. That's what this ruling more or less finalized. Seems like a pretty workable solution, but a bunch of weird people are losing their minds because they can't compel speech.
@@MrMagnaniman It is a reasonable situation for anyone who gets that supporting the position of non discrimination is fine, but it is not ok to compel support by forcing it as an affirmative action which the Asher case essentially ended up as as there were two competing legal principles at work. One was discrimination in refusing to do the cake based upon the legal implications of the issue over gay marriage, but you also have the basic legal issues within the ECHR which grants freedom of speech and also freedom to privacy which was certainly infringed by the media storm over it. People cannot compel you to validate their argument by using court time unless theycan prove that you have broken the law by the use of a criminal action or have engaged in deceit, falsehood or libel and this case does open up some questions as to how this document entered the legal process without due validation as to it's authencity,
This reminded me of when I met someone in a bar waiting for the concert venue next door to open. I was a few hours drive from home, Michigan, in Toronto and we had a very civil conversation about US politics. I know neither one of us swayed the other, but it was still a friendly conversation. The guy ended up buying a ticket to go to the concert too.
That's what happens when you respect the other person's opinion, and don't try to belittle them or tell them they're wrong about everything. Just talk about what you think and why you think that, and be genuinely interested in listening. I had a roommate years ago who had a significantly different belief system from me, and we talked about our beliefs quite a bit, and those were some very interesting and informative conversations.
Great follow up to your previous video. I understand the ADF being irritated because many sites I saw did indeed imply that they may have generated the email. That was never the case in your video and I’m glad you made that abundantly clear. I watch you specifically because you are not political. Any time a legal matter comes up in the news I watch your channel along with Nate the Lawyer. Between the two of you I feel that I always get the legal truth of whatever is being discussed. I can’t tell you how many times I have forwarded your videos to other people. You and Nate the Lawyer are the rare voices of reason on the Internet. Please keep up the good work.
Lehto accused them of presenting "fake" facts to SCOTUS in the previous video. Now in this video title still refers to it as a "fake" document. That strongly implies that the lawyers (or their client) either faked the document themselves or at least knew it was fake. Yeah, there's a disclaimer buried somewhere in the video where he admits that it may not have been fake, or the lawyers may not have known it was fake, but his emphasis is on the idea that the website request was faked.
@@adrianmizen5070By definition it would be "fake" even if the person that was listed as requesting it was the one who actually requested it Õ_Õ and just denied it after the fact. The reason for this is pretty clear with the person being married already and if they actually did request it then they would be making a false request. After getting past that by every measure it would then be considered fake..... The lawyers on either side need not "know" any of this by the way for it to be "fake" and no "implying" is being done by addressing the document as fake. You could literally have a "troll" or unrelated 3rd party interjecting themselves into the case with none being the wiser because of the real nature of the case being the STATE as the aggressor not the person making the request.
BRAVO!! HEAR!! HEAR!! Lehto and Nate are exactly how the law should be presented to laypersons. I've wanted to do a very similar TH-cam channel myself despite the fact that I am NOT an attorney. But I don't trust TH-cam to treat me fairly as a new, small creator. People generally don't understand how badly they need solid legal information for the simple reason that they don't understand how incompetently the MSM is distributing legal information to them.
ha I'm totally shocked that people are commenting on video's they couldn't be bothered to watch. Both videos were very informative. And yes i actually watched them!
9:30 Emails contain metadata that can easily prove the veracity of the claim here. They shud be able to look at said info and see where it was actually sent from, which is how you prove whether an email is real or doctored and whether it was rly sent by the person alleged to have sent it
Right, get the full header, and it will tell whether it was a real message, or some kind of a fake message. If the full header isn't available, then that will open a pile of questions. What if it wasn't an e-mail, but rather an internal message on their website? It should still come with an IP address if the website was well designed. Since the guy wasn't a litigant, and hadn't necessarily intended his request to make its way to the supreme court one may not be able to compel testimony from him.
Was there anything saying the request was by email? It could have been an online form. Even if it was an email, not all emails contain all the metadata. This request was also from more than 5 years ago? I know my emails get deleted automatically after one year.
More GREAT commentary, very informative and well balanced! I appreciate the intent to accurately convey a complex and nuanced topic. I hope your comments receive the consideration deserved.
Thank you Steve for setting the example of factual argument. Sticking to facts creates constructive discussions and this is what so many people misunderstand.
The FACT is that provable lies were used to make the life of my child much harder in the future. Those of us affected by this directly have zero intention of respecting this blatantly illegal judgement. Not happening. If this is the hill the US wants to die on, so be it.
I saw a published report that says he is indeed married, has a child, and is wondering how anybody managed to fake a submission in his name. I don't know how to verify this.
Why waste time checking that a submission they made was true and correct? Hmm. Avoiding sanctions and bad publicity, perhaps? I doubt they'll face actual sanctions for it, but they're certainly getting the bad publicity they're due.
One question. Who paid? Last time I looked lawyers don't work for free and getting this case in-front of the SC would involve lots of lawyers and lots billable hours.
I always appreciate your videos Steve. You being a lawyer in Michigan that does one type of thing with the ability to say “no” to potential clients doesn’t apply here. The wedding web designer in Colorado was, supposedly, asked to do a wedding website. She wasn’t asked to do something “outside her lane”. Colorado has state laws forbidding turning people down over their sexual preferences. Just ask the guy who runs the bakery.. Even though Colorado has eventually lost every suit they bring against him, they manufacture even more “offenses” and sue him again. Regardless of whose side people take, in the end, this case was about the state forcing citizens to speak a certain way and ignoring the edicts of their own religion to satisfy “the state”.. It’s why there’s a first amendment, to limit the government against forcing people to speak how the government wants them to.
The State I think also agreed to stipulations stating they would charge her under their law if she didn't make a site, if the situation were to happen.
If they wanted, they could do an analysis of the email and check to see if it was actually sent from his email address. If that's the case, then he'd have to claim his email was hacked and it was sent by another person using his actual email account.
The email was from the website to her email. The system she used for requests generated emails from the info on the forms and sent them to her rather than keep a storage of requests on the website server. Which makes sense given the size of her business since it's significantly cheaper than shelling out for a separate storage solution. So unless the website provider kept the ip logs from 7 years ago, there's nothing to examine.
@@ravenshrike Guess the next step would be to check if her website generates cookies, but as a fellow web designer, he'd know if it did and could remove them if he wanted or even have used a private mode.
If the man was married for several years to a woman, then the likelihood he made the request is very low. The fact that having a request already made of her making a gay wedding website made her case that much stronger, makes it far more likely that either she or someone working on her case made this request. Occam’s razor would say the simplest answer is that the request was faked.
@CorporalDirge Given the email was sent 7 years ago, there's no chance of finding the cookie in question. Likely the computer the data would be on no longer exists.
@@barnabusdoyle4930 the request coming from another website designer makes it more likely it was him messing with her website. He wouldn't need to actually be gay, or even be legitimately requesting a gay website, if he's requesting she violate her beliefs.
Thank you for commenting about graphic designers having the right to "fire" their clients. I've been doing graphic design for a little over 20 years now, both freelance and in various firms, and I got a doozy of a story. At one firm we had someone come in looking to develop a brand for his new "engine." Since I was the closest thing to a gearhead in the office (I fiddle around with R/C Cars, hobbyist level not the cheap little toys you get at the toy store) they assigned him to me. After about 20 minutes of me asking him questions about his engine, and him evading every one of my inquiries because he was concerned about me "stealing his idea," I was able to piece enough together to realize he had some perpetual motion/water carburetor thing he thought was going to make him rich. I tried my best to politely explain I didn't think either myself or our firm were going to be able to help him (I tried explaining we only do signage for office buildings to dissuade him), but he was adamant he was going to hire us. He even went to the boss/owner with a stack of cash in hand saying we had been hired and he wasn't taking no for an answer. Boss was even doing his best trying to convince him we couldn't take him on, but he just wouldn't hear of it. I know his heart sank when he convinced him we didn't need a down payment as he escorted "PerpMo", as he came to be known, out of our offices. What followed was about 6 years of legal hell. About every 3 months he was filing some suit against the company and each of us employees. Thankfully we had a good law firm that was successful in routinely chewing him up and spitting him out. We didn't get any money from the counter suits but I know the law firm netted over $20,000 in legal fees. I did have a run in with him right before the "fungal-itus" hit us a few years back. It was an AIGA open house/meet-up and he was back at his spiel trying to get others to work for him. Apparently, he was well known to several members there and was escorted out after about 10 minutes. We all then spent a good portion of the rest of the meeting swapping stories about "PerpMo," the name which everyone latched on to, and the nightmare he had put several of us through. Any and all business owners should have the right to refuse service for reasonable instances. "PerpMo's" actions certainly would be considered reasonable instance. I don't normally do wedding invites, birthday invites, garage sale signs, etc. because it's not really my forte. I have done so for close friends and family, and even then I don't put much thought and effort into it. If someone comes up to me wanting to design invites to their wedding, no matter their "orientation," I would decline not because of my beliefs or feelings, but because I don't normally do it. And I should have the right to refuse clientele for any reason I deem reasonably necessary, no matter their feelings.
Exactly. Capitalism is the voluntary exchange of goods and services between two parties. Just because one party is geared towards a specific exchange of services shouldn't mean they are now obligated to offer it to anyone.
I believe people should even be able to refuse service for racist reasons. Today those people would be put out of business very quickly via social media. Why would anyone want to do business with someone who clearly is biased against them?
@@thedolittle Used to see this sign outside of restaurants long ago, and people certainly lack decorum a lot more now, but "no shirt, no shoes, no service" was nearly everywhere. There was a time when people would get dressed in their Sunday finery to just go grocery shopping, now it's pajamas and flip flops or, when overweight, yoga pants.
Anybody who would hire somebody who didn't want to put 100% or more for me, I would never hire them. That only makes sense but, not much of that going around now days. Great information Steve thanks.
Thank you for the break down of this, its hard to see through the outrage and confusion sometimes, I always look to some credible people like yourself for clarification.
The Metadata from the original recipient needs to be submitted from the recipient to make it a legal document. That needs to be made known to prove if a real ducument.document. it contains the sending server address and a whole lot more.
My problem with this was that they had Stewart's address & phone number as part of their pleading. They put that on their pleading but did not check with Stewart?
Why would you? SOMEONE sent that request. Thats all they used the request to show. I'd bet you a few bucks they knew it was probably someone making a request after the lawsuit was filed specifically to bait them into violating Colorado Law, but that doesnt change the fact that the request was made, so they could say "someone did the thing".
@@Barraind.Faylestar In most states, aren't cases like that also public in the first place when filed, so it wouldn't be like they wouldn't know what things were about...so the request coming in to either troll them or create problems is a higher possibility
What is Stewart's last name? There are over 40,000 people named Stewart in US. It might just be possible that they had a typo or something, which coincidentally lead to another guy named Stewart. 😂
"Manufactered outrage" would be a good description of filing court cases claiming you are being abused by something that didn't happen. And then getting all upset when people talk about it.
Neither side wanted a way out, so neither side dug into anything but the law. They both wanted a ruling on the hypothetical circumstances, so it made no sense to question the exact circumstances you wanted a ruling on.
My thoughts on this subject have always been basically the same as yours. "Why would you go to someone that you know will do a bad job" 🤷♂️ Edit: Thank you for keeping politics out of your videos!
Would your mind really go to "why would you go to someone who'd do a bad job?" if your great aunt came to you and told her the web developer wouldn't make her a wedding website because the dev doesn't think old people should have the right to get married? Being over the age of 40 is a protected class in this country, same as gender and sexual orientation. If so, you're just a bad person. If you instead would get a little outraged, then maybe ask yourself what it is about gay people that makes you not outraged first. But this is all irrelevant anyway, it's clear there was no standing in this case in the first place. I'm going to drag it out a little more though. What if the only mechanic in the small town your great aunt and her fiance are driving through on the way to their wedding refuses to fix their car when it breaks down in town, refusing because he hates old people, and doesn't think they should be able to get married. They're trapped there now, in the middle of a hot summer, so they go to the local gas station to buy some water while they figure out what they're going to do about being stranded in this town. But the employees at the gas station refuse to sell them water, because they find the mere idea the old people think they deserve to get married disgusting. So they decide to go stay in the motel 6 in town for the night so that you'll come pick her up tomorrow and get her out of this town. But the motel 6 refuses them too, because they think marriage between 2 old people is a sin and disgusting. So they sleep in their broken down car on the side of the road till you get there, and they explain everything that's happened to them, tear streaming down your great aunts face. Are you really going to tell her "you shouldnt care about that, they all would've done a bad job anyways"? Protected class discrimination cannot be allowed by business owners, because it only spells harm for those in a community that might need to rely on that business for something. There is no societal benefit to protected class discrimination in hiring or selling, it only brings harm.
Yeah, that’s already how that kind of employment worked, you could already simply choose not to take a job. It’s even more confusing why they brought it before the court.
Steve, I am with you on this. I have tried to do things as an artist, to provide something my client wanted but have it be a no go because their view was different than what they talked to me about and I end up out of money and a waste of products. I only take what I know I can produce and if I can not I send the client to someone who can.
Except, this is a license to discriminate based on religious opinion against a protected group. Would it be ok to deny a black person based on skin color, if your religion said so?
@@devilsadvocate701private individuals should have the right to hire or fire, or accept business from or not, anyone they see fit, for whatever reason, religious or otherwise. That doesn't make it "ok". It could very well be despicable. But it should be up to the business owner to make decisions for his business, and up to the market to decide how to treat that business.
@@peterfox7663 so you think it should be up to the "free market" to decide who is fit to be served and who is not... that is a very slippery slope my friend. Convince me that this is for the betterment of society...
@@peterfox7663but these are not individuals. These are legal entities (businesses) created for the purpose to protect the individual according to the laws of the state. And the laws of the state say that if you are offering services, you must offer that service to all. If you don’t want to follow those laws, then you have two options. Don’t go into that business, or do, but don’t for a business to do so. The second would allow you, as an individual (not a business) to refuse whomever you please. See, businesses, as just bits of legal paper, have not soul, no conscience, no autonomy, so the business can’t be forced to speak against their religion as they can have none. The person running it does. When someone buys something, they are by paying from the business. The business takes the profit and distributes it as it sees fit. The individual running the business is protected by the business contract, but must also abide by the contracts of the state (in this case, non-discrimination).
Very early in my programming career, I interviewed with a place where their needs did not at all match my interests or abilities. I politely told them I wasn't interested, and they warned me that by not doing that kind of programming, I was missing out on a huge part of the market. But to me, that was like saying that by turning down a ditch-digging job, I was missing a big part of the market. Throughout the rest of my career, I never did any of that sort of work, but somehow I got by. I agree with Steve than you should be able to turn down work, for any reason or no reason, and not be forced to do it. Being forced to do the work is a kind of slavery. Sure, they'll pay you for the work, but they're still forcing you to do work you don't want to do. My wife and I once went to a whitesmith to get a bit of jewelry made. The smith listened to our description, and looked at drawings, of what we wanted, and got visibly excited. She had changes based on material properties, that sort of thing, but ended up making something very much like what we'd envisioned. We knew from her excitement and engagement on it that however good she was at her work, we were going to get her best work. If she'd been upset at the subject matter, and hesitant to do the work, or outright refused, we'd have just gone elsewhere, not sued. There's always *someone* out there with both the skillset and the will to do the job.
If Laurie filed the lawsuit one day and on the following day received a request for the exact thing the lawsuit was about, shouldn't that have raised red flags for her lawyers ?
25:55 “I hope that didn’t offend too many people” 😂😂😂 Oh Steve, you are SO going to get engagement 😆 on this. It just comes with being on the internet.
Steve, you are absolutely correct. You and most businesses be they creative or not, are SPECIALISTS. There's a very good reason for this. For hundreds of years, the total body of human knowledge far exceeds what one single person can do. Specialization is NECESSARY. Lawyers, doctors, scientists, musicians, artists, all specialize; because they HAVE to. There is no way possible to get the job done, otherwise.
I'm a web designer and we use templates. There's zero reason why this designer could not have made one for a gay couple. She CHOSE not to. The ADF lied when they said she could not do it.
@@Alverant Regardless of the larger issue.. Your statement is not correct. Dave stated "this person requested Lori design custom graphics for a same sex wedding."
Yes, creatives need the freedom to turn down work. There does need to be a bright line drawn for refusing to sell a product or service that is not dependent on knowing who the buyer is. In the case of the baker that made the wedding cakes, they would have every right to refuse service for custom cakes, but they could not refuse to sell a pre-made cake with no customizations.
If I recall in the Colorado baker case, he did offer a nondescript cake to the couple. He just refused to employ his artistic creativity for their special event.
I mostly agree, however it's really hard to know where to draw the line here. For instance, a local baker here has a service where you can submit your own image and they will print it on a cake. Can they refuse certain things?
^ This is why the question of what constitutes "speech" was a major issue in the case. During oral arguments, a significant amount of time was dedicated to the question of how much creative input went into each website. Creative expression doesn't need to contain words to be considered speech.
The case in Oregon they specifically said they sell things to gay people all the time, they just refused to make the wedding cake because that's endorsing or helping a gay wedding which they have every right not to support
Also... submitting anything for a case received after the case started without doing a complete documentation of it's source is inexcusable. The moment the lawyers saw the request via email or printout, they should have gone back to the email server for the complete header data and back to the web server hosting the request form to get the origin date, time, and IP address. Doing otherwise is complete evidence collection failure.
Thanks Steve for the thorough background on this. My wife and I are supporters of the LGBTQ community and we also agree with you (and SCOTUS) that small business have the right to take on or refuse to take on work based on their expertise and personal preferences.
My SO and I have the same take. Yes, we support LGBTQ+ rights. Yes we have family that identifies that way. But at the end of the day we believe that people shouldn’t be forced to do something they don’t want to do.
I have been subscribed to your channel and today was the first time I have heard this one. Love your channel maybe a president will see your channel and nominate you for justice.
Like what you have done over the last 4 years that I have followed you. Your first video talked about the same issues that I wondered about. I agree that this video was needed and show you asking questions that a good educator would be asking for all his followers to consider. That why I like this channel as you ask the questions that make reasonable people think.
Probably not. The standard of personal knowledge wouldnt be tested against the statements in the request, just of the request itself. If you could testify that to the best of your knowledge and belief, the form in question was the same form as had been submitted through the website, it would hold up for the purposes they used it for, which is saying that request had been submitted through the website (and not by their client, themselves, or associates therein). That will vary based on state. Texas, for instance, requires "good faith".
@@Barraind.Faylestar when you state, "...the purpose they used it for..." does that mean as supplementary info (or whatever the official term is), not part of the official... claims?
Yeah Steve, your first video is cleanly objective in its (your) questions and presentation. Thanks for sharing your professional perspective too! Staying in your professional "lane" is a great analogy.
Sometimes people just want to be outraged and express their outrage. If they feel it's unnecessary to gather a little more information before sharing their outrage, they will be left wondering why they encounter disagreement!
Why would they? If I express outrage over a set of presumed facts, I want to know if the actual facts are different. If you try to object to my outrage, you're just wrong.
Your opinion was worth the wait. It’s just good business practices, to gracefully be able to turn down business. I was in the printing industry. Graphic artists typically couldn’t afford the fallout of a bad interaction. It was customary for artists to hand off the client to an artist who did agree with their requests, and vice versa. I protected ALL of the artists, because it’s just better for business. I also worked with people who were challenging sometimes. Money was the same, but if I really wanted to discourage business from them… estimates could run a bit high.
Here's the question, where's the line? Can a "sandwich artist" say "I don't feel inspired to make your sandwich because you're black?" Obviously in this case the question is hyperbolic and I would hope your answer to that would be no. I believe that this pushes us back towards the idea of "Separate but equal" being considered okay. So I ask you, how do we find that line?
@@coffeecoder8162 Can a sandwich artist, baker, photographer, floral designer, or any other creative worker say "no" without the being accused of some -ism or -phobia?
@@coffeecoder8162That’s really a great question… where I see the line is if you’re being asked to produce/perform your product/service in a way that violates your beliefs. So, making a sandwich, the end product will be identical regardless of the race/sex/orientation/disability/etc of who asks for it. They’ll each get the same ham and cheese on a loaf that you make. Now, if you’re a muslim caterer and asked to make your falafels with pork, that’s a problem and should be allowed to be graciously refused. In this scenario, the website designer (or baker) shouldn’t be allowed to refuse their customary service to anyone based on their race/gender/etc, but neither should they be obligated to serve anyone in a “way” they don’t agree with. Just brainstorming here. These are just my first thoughts to that issue, and I’m still open to discussion.
@@coffeecoder8162 The person you are responding to was reporting common practice. The issue is that the Supreme court has said that 303 is [now] allowed to openly discriminate against gay couples in their marketing. They want the right to use bigotry as their main selling point.
@@jester9118 My personal rule of thumb is "If I swapped *insert big oogabooga of the moment here* with another group. like black, Muslim, Asian, etc- if it sounds bigoted, it probably is." People hiding behind religion, in violation of their religion's actual texts (IE: For I was the stranger and you welcomed me, or Do unto others as you would have others do unto you) personally disgust me. I feel that those people should have the freedom to fail- and preferably SHOULD fail. Separate but equal sounds great on paper, but in reality is disgusting- and should NOT be a standard in any circumstance. I keep thinking that the courts could not keep ruling worse than Citizen's United or Bush v Gore- but Dobbs and 303 Creative are trumping even those spectacular failures. Plessy V Ferguson is NOT a legal standard that should apply today.
Yes you are correct, too many people make comments on YT w/out actually having watched let alone listened to videos before commenting. With that being said - you did nothing wrong in your original video.
The Supreme Court is so hard to get a case in front of. I find it a bit incredulous that a case with no one in good standing on either side could appear in front of it.
This court has proven beyond any doubt that it's corrupt. Based on what I've heard, I'm convinced it was based on a fake complaint, and the court knew this. Imagine if liberals won a case which was later found to be based on a fake complaint. The outrage would be so loud. We've heard enough fake umbrage to know that just because those people are whining about libel doesn't make it so.
The Supreme Court is corrupt, and these people presented a case that the corrupt court wanted to use to exempt "Christians" from the law. They don't care. The ADF doesn't care. They're all about the outcome, and don't care that they have to bear false witness in order to achieve that outcome.
@@anandrew6641 just because you believe that doesn't mean it is true. There was only the supposed potential controversy IF they added notices to their website to state no LGTBQ weddings. So no, there really wasn't standing it was a made up case on potential harm and even had questionable evidence.
It's simple, you don't go to a plumber for electrical work, you don't go to a electrician for bricklaying work and you don't go to a bricklayer for plumbing. All tradesmen.
I watched the first video. Steve, you seem to have a pretty clear grasp on these things the youngsters don't, but a show from our childhood, "Dragnet" demonstrated it in a short statement. "Just the facts, ma'am." You have covered it well and I don't know why anyone would question your analysis of a "news story". This one is indeed a puzzle, and I am skeptical that a case like this made it to SCOTUS without all the crap that had to come in the lower courts having confirmed that someone below did at least a minimal amount of due diligence. If such diligence did not occur, might I suggest some disbarments are in order?
It's totally irrelevant to the case and the outcome. The law was unconstitutional on its face, and was overturned. It's pathetic, how many people are upset that a bad law was overturned.
With every email sent, there is a header and the email viewer usually only displays the basic to/from information. If you want do see it yourself, select an email and then select "view source" (slightly different process for each email viewer but is will be there somewhere). In that you can see who originated the email and what path it took to get to you. Did this get saved for the email in question or are the attorneys that filed the brief unaware of how email works? It would seem that an attorney the files a suit should be competent with regard to the case they are submitting or at least understand that they are not and hire a person who is to assist them.
It was a web form which then generated an email. Everyone knew where the email came from. Who filled out the web form is the unknown, and the courts explicitly stated that it did not matter anyway.
Nick Rekieta already dealt with this five days ago, the fact that Colorado either assumed it was true or didn't look into it is their problem, but the bigger problem as Nick pointed out is you don't know if this guy, a friend, or aquatence who could be an activist used his information right after this was filed. Everyone on the left wants this tossed, but as he put it, it was on the point that Colorado's commission was going to go after them as soon as there was such a situation similar.
Or even just someone wanting to create a problem for 1 or 2 competitors there. I also kind of see this as something where there would be several better options if the web designer wanted to create it, just go with an actual activist doing it rather than a random competitor
The law doesn't have to even be enforced, in order to be unconstitutional... states are expressly forbidden, by the Constitution, from MAKING any law that violates the Bill of Rights. If Colorado was dumb enough to actually attempt to enforce their law, they would commit the federal crime of 18 USC 242 Deprivation of rights under color of law.
Apparently, they just want innocent people to have their businesses destroyed and rot in prison for a few years before anyone is allowed to understand the law.
I think the facts in this situation really need to be looked into if for no other reason than to clear those who didn't have a part in creating the document. As is pointed out in the video, as it stands now, everyone on Earth could be the one, or part of a group, who created the request. Steve, your opinion is very well thought out and I happen to agree. I am a retired school teacher who would never have considered turning a student away due to the color of their skin or who they wanted to take to Prom but that is very different than a creative process such as website design. I think a situation like a grocery store, or a fast food outlet, should not be permitted to discriminate for reasons not related to their service or products. For example, they should not be able to refuse to sell groceries to someone because they have a different color of skin than the owner but they should be able to deny service to someone who causes trouble that could affect the products, like maybe is doing things that could easily spread disease in the fresh produce section. The legislative process came down to "business" as who the laws are about rather than the type of business. Now the Judicial branch through its adversarial process has to find ways to distinguish between what businesses can discriminate and for what things. That will take time and many rulings. One thing many need to understand is the legal system through the three branches of our government cannot right every wrong. We are still trying to make it so the wrongs out there are not being imposed by the government.
Their definition of "implied slander" is absurd. Like, if you simply report the facts, and the facts look very suspicious, that's "implied slander" because they deny what the facts make it look like they may have done.
Although we must always think about all. Those who don't want any truth tend to desire staying that way. In that those people need more help yet we may not be capable of giving help. Steve please continue making videos. Those of us who want hear all truth appreciate you beyond those wanting be blinded. There are us that watch every video you air. Count us in the truth we appreciate you. And let's humble ourselves to those that cant allow themselves reached. Its important to keep trying. If we didn't there wouldn't be any hope possible for those that want believe lies. Thank you Steve!
You are reminding me of an episode of Hot Bench where a Lady is seeing a contractor that she hired to build something and doesn't want to pay because it's not pretty!
Thank you for pointing out the obvious to turning down work I often wonder why people take offense when they get turned down for someone who isn't inspired or doesn't feel they came deliver the quality service the customer is looking for.
It is the would-be web designer who brought the case. It was a fake case generated by a conservative law firm to talk advantage of a radicalized Supreme Court.
This sounds like one of those situations where people submit cases in the hopes of an easy win. Similar to when people threaten to sue business for not meeting disability requirements.
The woman (303 Creative) is a graphic designer and aspiring web designer. So is the person whose details were used in the bogus form. She is the most likely person to already have those details to hand, and available to utilise.
Or, the other guy Stewart. He could have seen her as a competitor and tried to “cancel” her in this day and age. Once it went to the Supreme Court he backtracked and played possum. Who knows?
@@rosdar76 That would only make sense if he'd sent the request before the case was filed, it was sent one day after when someone realised they didn't have an actual request to point to. Also, why use his own real name and address?
Yes, it's extremely difficult to find a random name and associated phone number on the internet in this day and age. And if you try, you only find the names and phone numbers of strangers who do exactly what you do. You entirely believe the (second hand, not under oath) word of a guy you didn't know existed until last week, but throw shade on a woman who essentially made her entire life an open book for the past 8 years when she filed the lawsuit.
@@johnbriggs3916 - You say bad faith, SCOTUS says good faith and entirely warranted. Sorry it offends you to discover people you don't like have civil rights too.
Agree with you 100 %. I’m a landscape painter and am not good at portraits, so it’s only natural that I don’t paint portraits. I’d be pretty upset if someone tried to force me, legally force me to paint theirs. Some people seem to constantly be looking for reasons to be offended.
I think you do a great job speaking and explaining things to people, reminds me of my business law professor. So you are not just a great lemon law lawyer.
The sheer number of people commenting on the previous video saying that people aren't allowed to sue over an unconstitutional law before they get arrested under in was supremely disappointing. That so many people think you aren't allowed to stand up to threats of abuse until you actually get abused just because the abuser is the government is absolutely depressing.
Yeah and SCOTUS has a special solicitude over 1st Amendment pre-enforcement challenges that I think at times has been convoluted but is necessary sadly. Yes you can raise questions of the constitutionality of a statute as part of an attack in criminal court but its a hell of a risk. Federal courts traditionally did not even have federal question jurisdiction or even the ability to enjoin government officials from enforceing unconstitutional laws until Ex parte Young really but you could always bring an action in state court none the less.
@@millitron3666 Just the opposite. 1st Amendment pre-enforcement challenges arguably have less requirements for standing than other types of pre-enforcement challenges. Or at least the courts have come to that conclusion for better or for worse.
My wife is a licensed attorney and oversees "sworn documents" and bankruptcy compliance for one of the largest banks in the U.S. I showed her this video and she could just shake her head. The attorney that signed the sworn statement for the Court when they were electronically uploaded should catch hell over this.
Why should you catch hell for this? I work for clients from time to time and, aside from a few phone calls, have communicated electronically exclusively. The communication and data I produce/collect is absolutely admissible in court. Form submissions are no different. The “veracity” of EVERYTHING is a complicated ontological and epistemological question, even when calibrated scientific equipment is used to produce it. What matters here isn’t whether the content of the form submission was true and/or a troll. As Steve says, what matters is whether the form submission was submitted; it was unnecessary too, lol. This is nothing more than idiots getting pissy because they’re idiots and did idiot things like make bogus assumptions.
I don't see how the attorney didn't act in good faith. Electronic documents fly all around.
The designer received a request and thought it was valid.
So the attorney would assume the electronic doc was valid too.
There is no need or requirement to swim back against the current and check it out with the purported originator, is there?
That attorney did not mistakenly submit that filing, meaning it was done at the behest of someone. They will be rewarded by the requester.
@@TimeSurfer206 No they didn't. The form submission was received after the complaint was filed, It wasn't in and of itself part of the complaint. The form was not being submitted to the court as evidence of the truth of it contents but as an example of the type of request in question. What was sworn to was effectively: "We received this form, containing these details and a request of this nature." That the details the form contained turned out to be false is largely irrelevant as it was not being presented as evidence that those details were true.
@@TimeSurfer206 TDS much ?
Doesn’t the lawyer who presents data to the court, have responsibility to verify the data?
Not for the Right who are on an agenda like Stephen Miller.
@@MeredithPutvincould it be that we ,the people, put a stop to the crazyness in govt? When the criminals in govt. start putting crazy fakes into circultion then we need to do something!
@@thomastolbert6184 I am in a straight up blue state. Even my Congress Critters and local officials.
One of my Reps is Minority Whip Clark
To be fair, I do not blind just vote blue in the Primary. I do look at platforms and record. In the general, I refuse to give Conspiracy Nutjobs my vote...
This includes RFK, Jr. And his cousin was my district rep before trying to unseat Markey.
@@MeredithPutvin the hilarious thing about your comment is you legitimately think your team doesn't act the same way. You are everything wrong with America
@@MeredithPutvin your brain is so smooth
Can’t a key witness in a civil suit, like “Stewart,” be deposed by the defense? Why didn’t the state of Colorado seek to depose him?
A wild tayzonday has appeared!
Neither party in the case made "Stewart" a key witness. It seems that both parties wanted this case to be heard by the appellate courts and neither was interested in actual facts.
The same reason the Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett all became bold faced liars when they promised never to overturn Roe v Wade based on established precedent. They LIED to the entire United States of America.
@@goldenalt3166 Part of that was the nature of this complaint. This was a pre-enforcement challenge, so the fact that a request was made may have been helpful but not necessary to plead the injury.
@@davidsorensen2116 If it was "helpful" then both sides failed in their duty to vet the evidence presented.
FWIW, I think you did absolutely fine wading through this, Steve. People need to calm down and try to think straight.
Or think gay if that's their thing, it's totally cool and we don't have to make a federal case out of it ;)
I agree but doubt it is going to happen, to many people are just so closed minded to have a robust discussion or debate.
Just so you know I'm OK with your opinion on this video, but the main reason I like your videos is because you are very good at presenting facts and not dilute things with your opinions. You stick to what the law's are and present the facts of both sides. Thank you for your time and effort to make great content.
Absolutely 💯 💯 💯
Steve, Brilliant, Honest and all with good humor! Excellent.
The fact that the fake request came exactly 1 day AFTER*** the case was filed should have been a giant red flag for everyone.
Someone at CNN was probably monitoring filings for anything related to the new law, and sent a request, to see if they could come up with a juicy Fake News story.
And definitely a reason for the details contained to be triple checked..
Or the fact that she filed the case before she had even filed to establish the business in the first place.
Not a single entity has proven that a single thing about the request was "fake." If they have, please provide the evidence. And no, what the guy whose name was on the request tells a reporter 8 years later is not proof - in any court.
@@originalbluebuddha It's not proof, but it _is_ a reason to check. Have you checked? Do you even know how to check? Most people likely haven't because it costs money to even see what they submitted in the original case. But you know what's suspicious? ADF Legal made no reference to anything related to the methods one would use to validate that an email is legitimate, instead choosing to attack the people asking and deflect to other topics.
So the claim that "no entity has proven a single thing about the request was fake" is disingenuous - it appears nobody has checked, and likely the means to check were not included in what was submitted.
But hey, I have a fully grown live adult elephant in my bedroom closet. Prove I don't.
Thanks Steve. I appreciate your insight and expertise. Don’t worry about negative comments. There are a lot of people who are more than happy to share their uninformed opinions. You do good work.
A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still.
@StevenWood1210 Attorneys do almost nothing else BUT give their opinions and the nature of the system is dispute between parties who rarely actually agree, even after a court issues a ruling. I don't suffer them either, but I disagree with the idea that giving one's opinion won't change anyone's mind. Making the case for a Constitutionally based opinion might not make your opponent like it, but it can generate understanding and respect.
I do like that you keep things factual. I'm incredibly politically plugged in and I like getting big news like this without the emotionally charged wording, it makes the facts clear from a legal perspective, which is usually missing from what I see.
This video can be summed up with "It was a pre-enforcement challenge to an unconstitutional law, which was overturned."
It's actually unconstitutional for a state to even MAKE a law that violates your right to free speech (let alone, attempt to enforce that law).
@@hxhdfjifzirstc894 I uh, never implied it wasn't.
I was just saying that a lot of TH-camrs wouldn't get to the underlying law(s) behind this case.
@@hxhdfjifzirstc894no one’s free speech was infringed. But you probably support Tommy Tuberville .
Where's all your license plates?
@@eft6775why is nobody asking this??
Best advice I've ever been given, "question authority and think for yourself".. Words to live by.
Most of the people in the comments of this video and the last video, have no ability whatsoever to think for themselves. They get led around by the nose by Fake News, daily.
Sounds like the sort of thing flat earthers and other science deniers say all the time. It's always good to remain skeptical but needs to be balanced. Perspective needs to be applied. In the vast majority of cases, William of Ockham's (Occan's razor) approach is the correct one.
@@robguyatt9602Sounds like you’re a Democrat!!
Timothy Leary
@@RaspingPompano2sounds like you don't read much.
I actually like that steve avoids political stuff. Sure its fun listening to him talk about SCOTUS cases, but people are crazy and hed get too much drama.
Apparently, with some folks, the concept of free speech is also now a political matter and the government now has "rights" to tell private parties to squelch it on behalf of the ruling party... unless of course, we are talking about doing it to the OTHER party. Is free speech, therefore now, political? If so, anything can qualify as political so long as there is someone who makes it political. There are Constitutional matters here including the rights of speech and association.
the scotus is there to judge right and wrong, not politics, which is why the wheels are coming off their trolley.
@@Papadoc1000 imagine believing that scotus isn't biased, partisan and for sale... regardless of the facts in this case.
the entire appointment process is dubious from front to back, lets look at who selects these judges, partisan 'think tanks' handpick individuals they groomed for the job.
when one can look at who appointed which judge and reliably predict how they will vote on any given case, then its not law or justice, its whomever has enough money to groom and push forward their 'people' for the job.
@@jbodden6977the current SCOTUS is corrupt as fuck
@@paladroou can read their rulings and easily tell who writes logically and who writes overemotional gobbledygook. The dissent in this one was absurd. Also interesting that people want to blame the conservatives for partisanship when the three liberal justices also never break ranks in political cases. This one should have been a cut and dry 9-0 Opinion but instead the three progressive justices doubled down on their belief that the government has a right to mandate speech.
Mr.Lehto, you are very much appreciated .
I’m no lawyer but it surprises me that any documents used in a case that there isn’t a record of who submitted it and who received it and that anything submitted to the court isn’t vetted. If a lawyer submitted the documents without confirming where they came from and that they’re not fake, I could only point at them for manufacturing them.
So let’s see…” I received this request”
We need to vet it..”OK, here is the email I received”
What more is the plaintiff required to do if they aren’t using the document?
Since this was a form the only information they would have is the information in the form. It wouldn't have all the header information from an email sender. If they don't log the IP of the submitter due to an abundance of caution for ridiculous data privacy concerns then that's all the data they would have is that which is contained within the form. Blame GDPR and CCPA for the lack of the information you want. It's simpler to just treat everyone like the most paranoid law than carve things out and hope you got it right.
It may seem surprising to you, but this is standard practice. If you knew how common it was, you might lose all faith in the judicial system.
It is far too common that a lawyer, specifically a prosecutor, just says, "Oopsie poopsie. I accidentally fabricated a bunch of evidence. I pwomise it was an accident."
Just look at two of the highest profile trials recently; Kyle Rittenhouse and Johnny Depp. In the Rittenhouse trial, the prosecutor deliberately fabricated evidence and then outright lied to the judge about it. In the Depp trial, Heard's lawyer showed two identical pictures and tried to say they were different pictures taken on different days.
And the judge just accepts it. There aren't any real repercussions for lying in court or fabricating evidence, especially if it is the state fabricating evidence. As long as someone says, "I didn't mean to lie," then they get away with it.
I was a little surprised that it wasn’t vetted. I would think that’s why you have one of your clerks making phone calls. But in the end, it really wasn’t needed for the case. It’s kind of like having a 10 pound wedding cake and then adding a sprinkle on top of it. You didn’t really need the sugar in that sprinkle to make it a high sugar dessert. (And yes, I did use a wedding cake on purpose. )
I love that you still put out this video knowing full well that the angry people won't even watch this😂😂😂. Good for you, Steve, love your show!
TBH, he's an attorney and I'm sure he's used to people being very angry at him. Not that it really makes it OK, but it is common for one litigant or another to be very angry at the attorneys involved when they don't like the outcome.
Why wouldn't they?
His opening remarks about that brought to mind his video about the Aussie chef who banned veg heads and the suspect “reviews” he dealt with about his choice.
It's amazing how many people spend several hours a day commenting on videos and articles that they don't bother to watch or read.
@@kerwinbrown4180 Why? One word - deplorable...
i've always been under the impression that forcing anyone to do anything they don't want to do is a breach of there freedoms
Not if government does it, then they are an authority that trumps the Constitution most of the time.
even as a lay person I know that part of the responsibility of the lawyers is to do their due diligence to any paperwork submitted by their client in order to ensure it is authentic as such a discovery during the trial would be devastating to their case, it is also their responsibility to check the paperwork submitted by the opposing side, this is why legal fees are so expensive since lawyers usually don't do all of that work, they usually hire someone to check all of that for them.
You kind of have it backwards. It is on the opposing party to show due diligence and discover if the other party is lying.
If you lose a court case due to a lie by the other party and only learn it was a lie after the trial, the judge will say, "Tough shit. You should have brought that up before the trial was over."
A lawyer had a duty of candor to the court. They aren't allowed to knowingly and intentionally lie. And good luck proving it was intentional. Even if you do, that won't change the trial. They lying is considered a separate issue with a separate disciplinary actions.
@@malcanth3481 Doubt it since as an attorney you are signing any documents and presenting it as fact and acting as an officer for the courts so the onus is on the lawyer to do their research and ensure their clients paperwork is in order.
Now while any lawyer worth their weight in salt should also check the paperwork of the opposing side the onus is not on them to make sure it's all above board. If you loose a court case due to a lie by the other party and only learn it was a lie after the trial there have to be an appeal done in the applet court presenting the new evidence (The false document).
For example what if someone was convicted of murder and the officer testified that he found DNA evidence at the scene of the crime and it was only after the trial was over that it came to light that the officer planted the evidence, it was still a lie and you're seriously gonna sit there and say a judge is gonna say ''tough shit''?
@@malcanth3481Nope, and you should know it. A lawyer signs an affidavit that HIS documents are correct and researched. Recently some lawyers got into trouble for this because they submitted some hallucinations of GPT - and the court did not like that.
@ThomasTomiczek A lawyer signs that his documents are true and correct "to the best of his knowledge." That's why I said they can't knowingly lie.
And in the hypothetical you brought up, you are talking about when new evidence is discovered. The evidence being that it was discovered the DNA was planted. That is different from when the evidence could have been easily discovered and the lawyer just didn't.
I say this because lawyers get away with it ALL the time. It is the same way police always get out of trouble for lying in court. "I didn't lie. Someone else lied to me." "I didn't lie. It was just a mistake." "I didn't lie. I'm just wrong." "I didn't lie. I'm just stupid and bad at my job."
If you get caught intentionally lying, yeah, you're fucked. But if you can come up with an excuse for why it wasn't a lie, it was just incorrect, then you get away with it. And lawyers are kind of experts at creating excuses for the inexcusable.
@ThomasTomiczek A lawyer signs that his documents are true and correct "to the best of his knowledge." That's why I said they can't intentionally lie.
And the chat GPT thing is irrelevant to this. I guess you could say the lawyers were lying about who did the work. But that would be them getting caught knowingly lying. Which I already said would get you fucked.
Here's the problem, why would someone in California who is a web designer in their own right hire someone in Colorado to design a website who had never designed a website before ? This whole case stinks to high heaven. I hope the guy in California sues their asses off
Who is he supposed to sue? How are you supposed to figure out who submitted that request?
@@tzaphkielconficturus7136 If the request came in via email, is there no forensics that could be done on it? I understand that spoofing could have been done, but some basic level of forensics on the email servers should be done to see if the sender bothered to cover their tracks.
@@NinNinVT21 If this came along in 2016 (I think that's when it started), it would be really hard to go that far back now and find anything meaningful
Whether it is the case here or not - lawfare is NEVER about obtaining the service or product that is supposedly the issue. It is about grinding any dissenter with their ideology under the heels of the "justice" system.
@@tzaphkielconficturus7136 Pretty easy to determine actually. All you have to do is confirm how the request was originally submitted and work from there.
I love the way you phrased your opinion on this one.
Steve, I appreciate your attempt to stay neutral when discussing cases!
Ive learned more about the Law from Steve than from anyone else.
I guess you haven't seen any of his civil asset forfeiture videos. He's not neutral at all on those.
Of course, that's a political cause that actually means something, rather than some divisive, manufactured, ultimately inconsequential nonsense being pushed by corporate media...
@@MrMagnaniman I thought he came off fairly neutral in those kind of videos.
@@I.PittyTheFool Really? Is it neutral when he regularly encourages his viewers to donate to a legal fund devoted to fighting CAF, QI, etc.?
I'm not, at all, saying that he's wrong to advocate for the Institute for Justice, but he's clearly not neutral on those issues. Of course, no good people are neutral about corrupt, sadistic, totalitarian policies. Those policies are pretty indefensible, so just covering them is choosing a side, as those perpetrating those crimes rely upon widespread ignorance to protect themselves. Neutral isn't the same thing as being good.
@@MrMagnanimaninteresting you couldn’t resist inserting your own biased opinions.
My question is, if this guy was listed on the case as the person who requested the website, why wasn't he, at a minimum, deposed or brought as a witness in the case?
Who needs evidence and facts when the sc will agree with your opinion either way? Too bad their billionaire friends don't take them on a submersible to the titanic, i heard the view is great
Because they wanted to straight up( no pun intended) lie and get all the way to the SCOTUS to set a standard and say Gay rights can be voided piece by piece.
Because whether the request was made or not was completely irrelevant to the issue at hand. Would just be a waste of money and time.
@neues3691 it's very relevant. It's like being charged for murder but they can't tell you who.
Yeah, I was shocked that the information had been out there for some time and no one verified it from day one. From watching 4 or 5 different lawyers on this issue it seems that it is not always done in a case like this. After watching this video I understand even more now and it makes more sense now.
As always, your video was...inspiring. Keep up the good work!
I had a boss try to get me to argue with an auditor. He told me you need to write an email saying he's wrong and your professional opinion is that his concerns are irrelevant to the matter. My response was that my professional opinion was that I was not qualified to make such a determination. He didn't last long.
The distinction has to be turning down custom based on identity,versus turning it down because of message.
Similar issue in the Asher's Bakery case over here in the UK. Where it was held that a bakery couldn't lawfully refuse to bake a cake because a customer is gay. But they can lawfully refuse to bake a cake with a message supporting gay marriage.
That's pretty much how it is in the U.S., too. That's what this ruling more or less finalized. Seems like a pretty workable solution, but a bunch of weird people are losing their minds because they can't compel speech.
@@MrMagnaniman It is a reasonable situation for anyone who gets that supporting the position of non discrimination is fine, but it is not ok to compel support by forcing it as an affirmative action which the Asher case essentially ended up as as there were two competing legal principles at work.
One was discrimination in refusing to do the cake based upon the legal implications of the issue over gay marriage, but you also have the basic legal issues within the ECHR which grants freedom of speech and also freedom to privacy which was certainly infringed by the media storm over it.
People cannot compel you to validate their argument by using court time unless theycan prove that you have broken the law by the use of a criminal action or have engaged in deceit, falsehood or libel and this case does open up some questions as to how this document entered the legal process without due validation as to it's authencity,
This reminded me of when I met someone in a bar waiting for the concert venue next door to open. I was a few hours drive from home, Michigan, in Toronto and we had a very civil conversation about US politics. I know neither one of us swayed the other, but it was still a friendly conversation. The guy ended up buying a ticket to go to the concert too.
That's what happens when you respect the other person's opinion, and don't try to belittle them or tell them they're wrong about everything. Just talk about what you think and why you think that, and be genuinely interested in listening.
I had a roommate years ago who had a significantly different belief system from me, and we talked about our beliefs quite a bit, and those were some very interesting and informative conversations.
Great follow up to your previous video. I understand the ADF being irritated because many sites I saw did indeed imply that they may have generated the email. That was never the case in your video and I’m glad you made that abundantly clear. I watch you specifically because you are not political. Any time a legal matter comes up in the news I watch your channel along with Nate the Lawyer. Between the two of you I feel that I always get the legal truth of whatever is being discussed. I can’t tell you how many times I have forwarded your videos to other people. You and Nate the Lawyer are the rare voices of reason on the Internet. Please keep up the good work.
Lehto accused them of presenting "fake" facts to SCOTUS in the previous video. Now in this video title still refers to it as a "fake" document. That strongly implies that the lawyers (or their client) either faked the document themselves or at least knew it was fake. Yeah, there's a disclaimer buried somewhere in the video where he admits that it may not have been fake, or the lawyers may not have known it was fake, but his emphasis is on the idea that the website request was faked.
It was fake
The word fake is in quotations, implying its not necessarily fake, just inferred so by the articles which these videos are premised in discussing
@@adrianmizen5070By definition it would be "fake" even if the person that was listed as requesting it was the one who actually requested it Õ_Õ and just denied it after the fact.
The reason for this is pretty clear with the person being married already and if they actually did request it then they would be making a false request. After getting past that by every measure it would then be considered fake.....
The lawyers on either side need not "know" any of this by the way for it to be "fake" and no "implying" is being done by addressing the document as fake. You could literally have a "troll" or unrelated 3rd party interjecting themselves into the case with none being the wiser because of the real nature of the case being the STATE as the aggressor not the person making the request.
BRAVO!! HEAR!! HEAR!! Lehto and Nate are exactly how the law should be presented to laypersons. I've wanted to do a very similar TH-cam channel myself despite the fact that I am NOT an attorney. But I don't trust TH-cam to treat me fairly as a new, small creator. People generally don't understand how badly they need solid legal information for the simple reason that they don't understand how incompetently the MSM is distributing legal information to them.
Very well put.
Good on you Steve.
Love the deep dig into this issue
ha I'm totally shocked that people are commenting on video's they couldn't be bothered to watch. Both videos were very informative. And yes i actually watched them!
The News delivered by a true professional. Well done Beau. Thank you for introducing me to his channel.
Who is Beau?
@@Randrew Beau of the Fifth Column is his TH-cam name
9:30 Emails contain metadata that can easily prove the veracity of the claim here. They shud be able to look at said info and see where it was actually sent from, which is how you prove whether an email is real or doctored and whether it was rly sent by the person alleged to have sent it
Right, get the full header, and it will tell whether it was a real message, or some kind of a fake message. If the full header isn't available, then that will open a pile of questions. What if it wasn't an e-mail, but rather an internal message on their website? It should still come with an IP address if the website was well designed.
Since the guy wasn't a litigant, and hadn't necessarily intended his request to make its way to the supreme court one may not be able to compel testimony from him.
This.
Was there anything saying the request was by email? It could have been an online form. Even if it was an email, not all emails contain all the metadata. This request was also from more than 5 years ago? I know my emails get deleted automatically after one year.
The metadata can be faked as well.
@@Tim.Stotelmeyer I tend to prefer following Halon's razor in these things
More GREAT commentary, very informative and well balanced! I appreciate the intent to accurately convey a complex and nuanced topic.
I hope your comments receive the consideration deserved.
Thank you Steve for setting the example of factual argument. Sticking to facts creates constructive discussions and this is what so many people misunderstand.
The FACT is that provable lies were used to make the life of my child much harder in the future. Those of us affected by this directly have zero intention of respecting this blatantly illegal judgement. Not happening. If this is the hill the US wants to die on, so be it.
I saw a published report that says he is indeed married, has a child, and is wondering how anybody managed to fake a submission in his name. I don't know how to verify this.
It's irrelevant to whether the law was unconstitutional... why even waste 2 seconds thinking about it?
Why waste time checking that a submission they made was true and correct? Hmm. Avoiding sanctions and bad publicity, perhaps?
I doubt they'll face actual sanctions for it, but they're certainly getting the bad publicity they're due.
"A man's got to know his limitations". Good follow-up and explanation. Thanks!
Actually, you are always thorough. I trust your posts for I know you know the laws and give factual information. Thank you for the work you do!
One question. Who paid? Last time I looked lawyers don't work for free and getting this case in-front of the SC would involve lots of lawyers and lots billable hours.
You nailed it! "Follow the money!"
I agree with your opinion wholeheartedly
Thanks Steve for making us think for ourselves
I always appreciate your videos Steve. You being a lawyer in Michigan that does one type of thing with the ability to say “no” to potential clients doesn’t apply here. The wedding web designer in Colorado was, supposedly, asked to do a wedding website. She wasn’t asked to do something “outside her lane”. Colorado has state laws forbidding turning people down over their sexual preferences. Just ask the guy who runs the bakery.. Even though Colorado has eventually lost every suit they bring against him, they manufacture even more “offenses” and sue him again.
Regardless of whose side people take, in the end, this case was about the state forcing citizens to speak a certain way and ignoring the edicts of their own religion to satisfy “the state”.. It’s why there’s a first amendment, to limit the government against forcing people to speak how the government wants them to.
That is why I like this channel. Even the opinions are helpful and informative, in this case presenting a helpful analogy
“I wouldn’t ask my carpet layer to install my HVAC.” Is that your point, Steve? Can I get a hell yeah!
Absolutely 💯
The State I think also agreed to stipulations stating they would charge her under their law if she didn't make a site, if the situation were to happen.
I like your treatment on this matter.
ChatGPT vouched for the veracity. It cited the case of Hootie & The Blowfish versus Nickleback (96-45 RPM, 1996)
If they wanted, they could do an analysis of the email and check to see if it was actually sent from his email address. If that's the case, then he'd have to claim his email was hacked and it was sent by another person using his actual email account.
The email was from the website to her email. The system she used for requests generated emails from the info on the forms and sent them to her rather than keep a storage of requests on the website server. Which makes sense given the size of her business since it's significantly cheaper than shelling out for a separate storage solution. So unless the website provider kept the ip logs from 7 years ago, there's nothing to examine.
@@ravenshrike Guess the next step would be to check if her website generates cookies, but as a fellow web designer, he'd know if it did and could remove them if he wanted or even have used a private mode.
If the man was married for several years to a woman, then the likelihood he made the request is very low. The fact that having a request already made of her making a gay wedding website made her case that much stronger, makes it far more likely that either she or someone working on her case made this request. Occam’s razor would say the simplest answer is that the request was faked.
@CorporalDirge Given the email was sent 7 years ago, there's no chance of finding the cookie in question. Likely the computer the data would be on no longer exists.
@@barnabusdoyle4930 the request coming from another website designer makes it more likely it was him messing with her website. He wouldn't need to actually be gay, or even be legitimately requesting a gay website, if he's requesting she violate her beliefs.
I saw your first video. Im sane and competent and understood you completely.
So that answers why the others did not understand you.
Very correct., but who says demon rats are sane
Thank you for commenting about graphic designers having the right to "fire" their clients. I've been doing graphic design for a little over 20 years now, both freelance and in various firms, and I got a doozy of a story. At one firm we had someone come in looking to develop a brand for his new "engine." Since I was the closest thing to a gearhead in the office (I fiddle around with R/C Cars, hobbyist level not the cheap little toys you get at the toy store) they assigned him to me. After about 20 minutes of me asking him questions about his engine, and him evading every one of my inquiries because he was concerned about me "stealing his idea," I was able to piece enough together to realize he had some perpetual motion/water carburetor thing he thought was going to make him rich. I tried my best to politely explain I didn't think either myself or our firm were going to be able to help him (I tried explaining we only do signage for office buildings to dissuade him), but he was adamant he was going to hire us. He even went to the boss/owner with a stack of cash in hand saying we had been hired and he wasn't taking no for an answer. Boss was even doing his best trying to convince him we couldn't take him on, but he just wouldn't hear of it. I know his heart sank when he convinced him we didn't need a down payment as he escorted "PerpMo", as he came to be known, out of our offices.
What followed was about 6 years of legal hell. About every 3 months he was filing some suit against the company and each of us employees. Thankfully we had a good law firm that was successful in routinely chewing him up and spitting him out. We didn't get any money from the counter suits but I know the law firm netted over $20,000 in legal fees.
I did have a run in with him right before the "fungal-itus" hit us a few years back. It was an AIGA open house/meet-up and he was back at his spiel trying to get others to work for him. Apparently, he was well known to several members there and was escorted out after about 10 minutes. We all then spent a good portion of the rest of the meeting swapping stories about "PerpMo," the name which everyone latched on to, and the nightmare he had put several of us through.
Any and all business owners should have the right to refuse service for reasonable instances. "PerpMo's" actions certainly would be considered reasonable instance.
I don't normally do wedding invites, birthday invites, garage sale signs, etc. because it's not really my forte. I have done so for close friends and family, and even then I don't put much thought and effort into it. If someone comes up to me wanting to design invites to their wedding, no matter their "orientation," I would decline not because of my beliefs or feelings, but because I don't normally do it. And I should have the right to refuse clientele for any reason I deem reasonably necessary, no matter their feelings.
Exactly. Capitalism is the voluntary exchange of goods and services between two parties. Just because one party is geared towards a specific exchange of services shouldn't mean they are now obligated to offer it to anyone.
I believe people should even be able to refuse service for racist reasons. Today those people would be put out of business very quickly via social media. Why would anyone want to do business with someone who clearly is biased against them?
@@MaydayAggro I agree, but I am the sort who would rather educate than socially isolate.
@@MaydayAggro
Because that gives them a reason to sue you for huge money!
@@thedolittle Used to see this sign outside of restaurants long ago, and people certainly lack decorum a lot more now, but "no shirt, no shoes, no service" was nearly everywhere. There was a time when people would get dressed in their Sunday finery to just go grocery shopping, now it's pajamas and flip flops or, when overweight, yoga pants.
Thanks Steve, now I've got the "AI sending fake emails" thing bouncing around in my head. We're screwed.
Anybody who would hire somebody who didn't want to put 100% or more for me, I would never hire them. That only makes sense but, not much of that going around now days. Great information Steve thanks.
Thank you for the break down of this, its hard to see through the outrage and confusion sometimes, I always look to some credible people like yourself for clarification.
The Metadata from the original recipient needs to be submitted from the recipient to make it a legal document. That needs to be made known to prove if a real ducument.document. it contains the sending server address and a whole lot more.
How wonderful for the news reporter to be the only one to think to call the person who sent the "request".
My problem with this was that they had Stewart's address & phone number as part of their pleading.
They put that on their pleading but did not check with Stewart?
It sounds like the CO law would expose them to some criminal or civil liability if they communicated with him in any way.
Probably because, with the Colorado law, it didn't really matter if it was real or not
Why would you? SOMEONE sent that request. Thats all they used the request to show.
I'd bet you a few bucks they knew it was probably someone making a request after the lawsuit was filed specifically to bait them into violating Colorado Law, but that doesnt change the fact that the request was made, so they could say "someone did the thing".
@@Barraind.Faylestar In most states, aren't cases like that also public in the first place when filed, so it wouldn't be like they wouldn't know what things were about...so the request coming in to either troll them or create problems is a higher possibility
What is Stewart's last name? There are over 40,000 people named Stewart in US. It might just be possible that they had a typo or something, which coincidentally lead to another guy named Stewart. 😂
"Manufactered outrage" would be a good description of filing court cases claiming you are being abused by something that didn't happen. And then getting all upset when people talk about it.
Did you even watch the whole video?
@@rosdar76Sounds like an accurate description to me. What do you think is wrong about the original post?
@@rosdar76 Your comment is an example of "manufactured outrage." Bellyaching because we are talking about the facts.
22:45, "And I'm doing us both a service by doing that." -- Yes, precisely. Excellent observation.
It's shocking that it could get this far before being discovered when it would've been so easy for this to be vetted right from the start.
The request had nothing to do with the case. It was not needed
⬆️ nonsense
@@rtjames except the nonsense is yours.
Neither side wanted a way out, so neither side dug into anything but the law. They both wanted a ruling on the hypothetical circumstances, so it made no sense to question the exact circumstances you wanted a ruling on.
Colorado AG was complicit. Josh Hawley's wife was working for the ADF.
Federalist Society Theater.
My thoughts on this subject have always been basically the same as yours. "Why would you go to someone that you know will do a bad job" 🤷♂️
Edit: Thank you for keeping politics out of your videos!
Would your mind really go to "why would you go to someone who'd do a bad job?" if your great aunt came to you and told her the web developer wouldn't make her a wedding website because the dev doesn't think old people should have the right to get married? Being over the age of 40 is a protected class in this country, same as gender and sexual orientation. If so, you're just a bad person. If you instead would get a little outraged, then maybe ask yourself what it is about gay people that makes you not outraged first.
But this is all irrelevant anyway, it's clear there was no standing in this case in the first place.
I'm going to drag it out a little more though. What if the only mechanic in the small town your great aunt and her fiance are driving through on the way to their wedding refuses to fix their car when it breaks down in town, refusing because he hates old people, and doesn't think they should be able to get married. They're trapped there now, in the middle of a hot summer, so they go to the local gas station to buy some water while they figure out what they're going to do about being stranded in this town. But the employees at the gas station refuse to sell them water, because they find the mere idea the old people think they deserve to get married disgusting. So they decide to go stay in the motel 6 in town for the night so that you'll come pick her up tomorrow and get her out of this town. But the motel 6 refuses them too, because they think marriage between 2 old people is a sin and disgusting.
So they sleep in their broken down car on the side of the road till you get there, and they explain everything that's happened to them, tear streaming down your great aunts face.
Are you really going to tell her "you shouldnt care about that, they all would've done a bad job anyways"?
Protected class discrimination cannot be allowed by business owners, because it only spells harm for those in a community that might need to rely on that business for something. There is no societal benefit to protected class discrimination in hiring or selling, it only brings harm.
Yeah, that’s already how that kind of employment worked, you could already simply choose not to take a job. It’s even more confusing why they brought it before the court.
Steve, I am with you on this. I have tried to do things as an artist, to provide something my client wanted but have it be a no go because their view was different than what they talked to me about and I end up out of money and a waste of products. I only take what I know I can produce and if I can not I send the client to someone who can.
Except, this is a license to discriminate based on religious opinion against a protected group. Would it be ok to deny a black person based on skin color, if your religion said so?
@@devilsadvocate701private individuals should have the right to hire or fire, or accept business from or not, anyone they see fit, for whatever reason, religious or otherwise.
That doesn't make it "ok". It could very well be despicable. But it should be up to the business owner to make decisions for his business, and up to the market to decide how to treat that business.
@@peterfox7663 so you think it should be up to the "free market" to decide who is fit to be served and who is not... that is a very slippery slope my friend. Convince me that this is for the betterment of society...
@@peterfox7663 btw... these are not "private individuals". This a public facing business, not a business who only serves a single payer.
@@peterfox7663but these are not individuals. These are legal entities (businesses) created for the purpose to protect the individual according to the laws of the state. And the laws of the state say that if you are offering services, you must offer that service to all.
If you don’t want to follow those laws, then you have two options. Don’t go into that business, or do, but don’t for a business to do so. The second would allow you, as an individual (not a business) to refuse whomever you please.
See, businesses, as just bits of legal paper, have not soul, no conscience, no autonomy, so the business can’t be forced to speak against their religion as they can have none. The person running it does. When someone buys something, they are by paying from the business. The business takes the profit and distributes it as it sees fit. The individual running the business is protected by the business contract, but must also abide by the contracts of the state (in this case, non-discrimination).
Very early in my programming career, I interviewed with a place where their needs did not at all match my interests or abilities. I politely told them I wasn't interested, and they warned me that by not doing that kind of programming, I was missing out on a huge part of the market. But to me, that was like saying that by turning down a ditch-digging job, I was missing a big part of the market. Throughout the rest of my career, I never did any of that sort of work, but somehow I got by. I agree with Steve than you should be able to turn down work, for any reason or no reason, and not be forced to do it. Being forced to do the work is a kind of slavery. Sure, they'll pay you for the work, but they're still forcing you to do work you don't want to do.
My wife and I once went to a whitesmith to get a bit of jewelry made. The smith listened to our description, and looked at drawings, of what we wanted, and got visibly excited. She had changes based on material properties, that sort of thing, but ended up making something very much like what we'd envisioned. We knew from her excitement and engagement on it that however good she was at her work, we were going to get her best work. If she'd been upset at the subject matter, and hesitant to do the work, or outright refused, we'd have just gone elsewhere, not sued. There's always *someone* out there with both the skillset and the will to do the job.
If Laurie filed the lawsuit one day and on the following day received a request for the exact thing the lawsuit was about, shouldn't that have raised red flags for her lawyers ?
Thank you for your extended expression of thought, on this and many subjects.
25:55 “I hope that didn’t offend too many people” 😂😂😂
Oh Steve, you are SO going to get engagement 😆 on this. It just comes with being on the internet.
Steve, you are absolutely correct. You and most businesses be they creative or not, are SPECIALISTS. There's a very good reason for this. For hundreds of years, the total body of human knowledge far exceeds what one single person can do. Specialization is NECESSARY. Lawyers, doctors, scientists, musicians, artists, all specialize; because they HAVE to. There is no way possible to get the job done, otherwise.
I'm a web designer and we use templates. There's zero reason why this designer could not have made one for a gay couple. She CHOSE not to. The ADF lied when they said she could not do it.
@Alverant
"I'm a web designer and we use templates"
Then you're a terrible web designer.
@@noahw4623 allmost al use templates ( so they can make them fast and make $$)
@@Alverant Regardless of the larger issue.. Your statement is not correct. Dave stated "this person requested Lori design custom graphics for a same sex wedding."
@@silentnot4812And they probably made websites for other weddings, so they would be in the same field.
Well done Steve!
Yes, creatives need the freedom to turn down work. There does need to be a bright line drawn for refusing to sell a product or service that is not dependent on knowing who the buyer is.
In the case of the baker that made the wedding cakes, they would have every right to refuse service for custom cakes, but they could not refuse to sell a pre-made cake with no customizations.
If I recall in the Colorado baker case, he did offer a nondescript cake to the couple. He just refused to employ his artistic creativity for their special event.
I mostly agree, however it's really hard to know where to draw the line here. For instance, a local baker here has a service where you can submit your own image and they will print it on a cake. Can they refuse certain things?
^ This is why the question of what constitutes "speech" was a major issue in the case. During oral arguments, a significant amount of time was dedicated to the question of how much creative input went into each website. Creative expression doesn't need to contain words to be considered speech.
The case in Oregon they specifically said they sell things to gay people all the time, they just refused to make the wedding cake because that's endorsing or helping a gay wedding which they have every right not to support
@@andrewk8636 So you would also be ok if they refused to make a cake for an interracial couple? Or a Jewish couple?
Also... submitting anything for a case received after the case started without doing a complete documentation of it's source is inexcusable. The moment the lawyers saw the request via email or printout, they should have gone back to the email server for the complete header data and back to the web server hosting the request form to get the origin date, time, and IP address. Doing otherwise is complete evidence collection failure.
Steve, I am always interested in, and appreciate, your opinion even in the off-chance I may not fully agree. Keep 'em coming!
Thanks Steve for the thorough background on this. My wife and I are supporters of the LGBTQ community and we also agree with you (and SCOTUS) that small business have the right to take on or refuse to take on work based on their expertise and personal preferences.
My SO and I have the same take. Yes, we support LGBTQ+ rights. Yes we have family that identifies that way. But at the end of the day we believe that people shouldn’t be forced to do something they don’t want to do.
@steve lehto SCOTUS used an article in a magazine as fact in doe Smith sorna case when even the author admitted it was not fact.
I have been subscribed to your channel and today was the first time I have heard this one. Love your channel maybe a president will see your channel and nominate you for justice.
Like what you have done over the last 4 years that I have followed you. Your first video talked about the same issues that I wondered about. I agree that this video was needed and show you asking questions that a good educator would be asking for all his followers to consider. That why I like this channel as you ask the questions that make reasonable people think.
8:59 This was my biggest question after your first video. Wouldn't the lawyer that submitted "Stuart's" request be at risk of a professional review?
Probably not. The standard of personal knowledge wouldnt be tested against the statements in the request, just of the request itself. If you could testify that to the best of your knowledge and belief, the form in question was the same form as had been submitted through the website, it would hold up for the purposes they used it for, which is saying that request had been submitted through the website (and not by their client, themselves, or associates therein).
That will vary based on state. Texas, for instance, requires "good faith".
@@Barraind.Faylestar when you state, "...the purpose they used it for..." does that mean as supplementary info (or whatever the official term is), not part of the official... claims?
Yeah Steve, your first video is cleanly objective in its (your) questions and presentation. Thanks for sharing your professional perspective too! Staying in your professional "lane" is a great analogy.
Sometimes people just want to be outraged and express their outrage. If they feel it's unnecessary to gather a little more information before sharing their outrage, they will be left wondering why they encounter disagreement!
Why would they? If I express outrage over a set of presumed facts, I want to know if the actual facts are different. If you try to object to my outrage, you're just wrong.
Your opinion was worth the wait. It’s just good business practices, to gracefully be able to turn down business. I was in the printing industry. Graphic artists typically couldn’t afford the fallout of a bad interaction. It was customary for artists to hand off the client to an artist who did agree with their requests, and vice versa.
I protected ALL of the artists, because it’s just better for business. I also worked with people who were challenging sometimes. Money was the same, but if I really wanted to discourage business from them… estimates could run a bit high.
Here's the question, where's the line? Can a "sandwich artist" say "I don't feel inspired to make your sandwich because you're black?"
Obviously in this case the question is hyperbolic and I would hope your answer to that would be no. I believe that this pushes us back towards the idea of "Separate but equal" being considered okay.
So I ask you, how do we find that line?
@@coffeecoder8162 Can a sandwich artist, baker, photographer, floral designer, or any other creative worker say "no" without the being accused of some -ism or -phobia?
@@coffeecoder8162That’s really a great question… where I see the line is if you’re being asked to produce/perform your product/service in a way that violates your beliefs. So, making a sandwich, the end product will be identical regardless of the race/sex/orientation/disability/etc of who asks for it. They’ll each get the same ham and cheese on a loaf that you make. Now, if you’re a muslim caterer and asked to make your falafels with pork, that’s a problem and should be allowed to be graciously refused. In this scenario, the website designer (or baker) shouldn’t be allowed to refuse their customary service to anyone based on their race/gender/etc, but neither should they be obligated to serve anyone in a “way” they don’t agree with. Just brainstorming here. These are just my first thoughts to that issue, and I’m still open to discussion.
@@coffeecoder8162 The person you are responding to was reporting common practice.
The issue is that the Supreme court has said that 303 is [now] allowed to openly discriminate against gay couples in their marketing. They want the right to use bigotry as their main selling point.
@@jester9118 My personal rule of thumb is "If I swapped *insert big oogabooga of the moment here* with another group. like black, Muslim, Asian, etc- if it sounds bigoted, it probably is." People hiding behind religion, in violation of their religion's actual texts (IE: For I was the stranger and you welcomed me, or Do unto others as you would have others do unto you) personally disgust me. I feel that those people should have the freedom to fail- and preferably SHOULD fail. Separate but equal sounds great on paper, but in reality is disgusting- and should NOT be a standard in any circumstance. I keep thinking that the courts could not keep ruling worse than Citizen's United or Bush v Gore- but Dobbs and 303 Creative are trumping even those spectacular failures. Plessy V Ferguson is NOT a legal standard that should apply today.
Yes you are correct, too many people make comments on YT w/out actually having watched let alone listened to videos before commenting. With that being said - you did nothing wrong in your original video.
The Supreme Court is so hard to get a case in front of. I find it a bit incredulous that a case with no one in good standing on either side could appear in front of it.
Obviously there was standing as the case was heard and ruled on.
This court has proven beyond any doubt that it's corrupt. Based on what I've heard, I'm convinced it was based on a fake complaint, and the court knew this. Imagine if liberals won a case which was later found to be based on a fake complaint. The outrage would be so loud. We've heard enough fake umbrage to know that just because those people are whining about libel doesn't make it so.
"Never let facts get in the way of a good political cause."
The Supreme Court is corrupt, and these people presented a case that the corrupt court wanted to use to exempt "Christians" from the law. They don't care. The ADF doesn't care. They're all about the outcome, and don't care that they have to bear false witness in order to achieve that outcome.
@@anandrew6641 just because you believe that doesn't mean it is true. There was only the supposed potential controversy IF they added notices to their website to state no LGTBQ weddings. So no, there really wasn't standing it was a made up case on potential harm and even had questionable evidence.
Good job on this one, Steve.
It's simple, you don't go to a plumber for electrical work, you don't go to a electrician for bricklaying work and you don't go to a bricklayer for plumbing. All tradesmen.
I watched the first video. Steve, you seem to have a pretty clear grasp on these things the youngsters don't, but a show from our childhood, "Dragnet" demonstrated it in a short statement. "Just the facts, ma'am." You have covered it well and I don't know why anyone would question your analysis of a "news story".
This one is indeed a puzzle, and I am skeptical that a case like this made it to SCOTUS without all the crap that had to come in the lower courts having confirmed that someone below did at least a minimal amount of due diligence. If such diligence did not occur, might I suggest some disbarments are in order?
It's always good when somebody uses "I'm old" as the theme of their argument.
Disbarment is a pretty heavy penalty if it was unintentional, but certainly the lawyer who submitted the fraudulent document should be sanctioned.
It's totally irrelevant to the case and the outcome. The law was unconstitutional on its face, and was overturned. It's pathetic, how many people are upset that a bad law was overturned.
@@hxhdfjifzirstc894 If I implied in any way that I disagreed with the decision, let me clear it up. I AGREE with the decision.
We only care about facts. It is a fact that a television show proves that only old people know what facts are. That's how facts work.
With every email sent, there is a header and the email viewer usually only displays the basic to/from information. If you want do see it yourself, select an email and then select "view source" (slightly different process for each email viewer but is will be there somewhere). In that you can see who originated the email and what path it took to get to you. Did this get saved for the email in question or are the attorneys that filed the brief unaware of how email works? It would seem that an attorney the files a suit should be competent with regard to the case they are submitting or at least understand that they are not and hire a person who is to assist them.
It was a web form which then generated an email. Everyone knew where the email came from. Who filled out the web form is the unknown, and the courts explicitly stated that it did not matter anyway.
@@originalbluebuddha Thanks for the clarification, that makes sense.
Nick Rekieta already dealt with this five days ago, the fact that Colorado either assumed it was true or didn't look into it is their problem, but the bigger problem as Nick pointed out is you don't know if this guy, a friend, or aquatence who could be an activist used his information right after this was filed. Everyone on the left wants this tossed, but as he put it, it was on the point that Colorado's commission was going to go after them as soon as there was such a situation similar.
Or even just someone wanting to create a problem for 1 or 2 competitors there.
I also kind of see this as something where there would be several better options if the web designer wanted to create it, just go with an actual activist doing it rather than a random competitor
The law doesn't have to even be enforced, in order to be unconstitutional... states are expressly forbidden, by the Constitution, from MAKING any law that violates the Bill of Rights.
If Colorado was dumb enough to actually attempt to enforce their law, they would commit the federal crime of 18 USC 242 Deprivation of rights under color of law.
Apparently, they just want innocent people to have their businesses destroyed and rot in prison for a few years before anyone is allowed to understand the law.
I think the facts in this situation really need to be looked into if for no other reason than to clear those who didn't have a part in creating the document. As is pointed out in the video, as it stands now, everyone on Earth could be the one, or part of a group, who created the request. Steve, your opinion is very well thought out and I happen to agree. I am a retired school teacher who would never have considered turning a student away due to the color of their skin or who they wanted to take to Prom but that is very different than a creative process such as website design. I think a situation like a grocery store, or a fast food outlet, should not be permitted to discriminate for reasons not related to their service or products. For example, they should not be able to refuse to sell groceries to someone because they have a different color of skin than the owner but they should be able to deny service to someone who causes trouble that could affect the products, like maybe is doing things that could easily spread disease in the fresh produce section. The legislative process came down to "business" as who the laws are about rather than the type of business. Now the Judicial branch through its adversarial process has to find ways to distinguish between what businesses can discriminate and for what things. That will take time and many rulings. One thing many need to understand is the legal system through the three branches of our government cannot right every wrong. We are still trying to make it so the wrongs out there are not being imposed by the government.
You were a school teacher? Dear god...
Steve - your answer to this was brilliant!
Their definition of "implied slander" is absurd. Like, if you simply report the facts, and the facts look very suspicious, that's "implied slander" because they deny what the facts make it look like they may have done.
If they think they have a case for slander against someone they should sue ... instead of blustering.
Although we must always think about all. Those who don't want any truth tend to desire staying that way. In that those people need more help yet we may not be capable of giving help. Steve please continue making videos. Those of us who want hear all truth appreciate you beyond those wanting be blinded. There are us that watch every video you air. Count us in the truth we appreciate you. And let's humble ourselves to those that cant allow themselves reached. Its important to keep trying. If we didn't there wouldn't be any hope possible for those that want believe lies. Thank you Steve!
You are reminding me of an episode of Hot Bench where a Lady is seeing a contractor that she hired to build something and doesn't want to pay because it's not pretty!
Thank you for pointing out the obvious to turning down work I often wonder why people take offense when they get turned down for someone who isn't inspired or doesn't feel they came deliver the quality service the customer is looking for.
It's FAKE! That's the whole point. The whole case is made up by Right Wing Groups.
I remember in the '60s there were certain chefs, culinary artists if you will, who were not inspired to create works for people of certain color.
Because of where it leads to . See Travers City , Michigan today . Already .
I thought this case concerned who public facing businesses can choose to serve, not what they choose to do for them
It is the would-be web designer who brought the case. It was a fake case generated by a conservative law firm to talk advantage of a radicalized Supreme Court.
This sounds like one of those situations where people submit cases in the hopes of an easy win. Similar to when people threaten to sue business for not meeting disability requirements.
Thanks for your videos, and I appreciate your dedication to facts and the law.
That SC decision should be wiped, rendered Null & Void.
this is what happens when you judge by only reading a headline and not an article.
Thanks. I loved this video. You were spot on
The woman (303 Creative) is a graphic designer and aspiring web designer. So is the person whose details were used in the bogus form. She is the most likely person to already have those details to hand, and available to utilise.
Or, the other guy Stewart. He could have seen her as a competitor and tried to “cancel” her in this day and age. Once it went to the Supreme Court he backtracked and played possum. Who knows?
@@rosdar76 That would only make sense if he'd sent the request before the case was filed, it was sent one day after when someone realised they didn't have an actual request to point to.
Also, why use his own real name and address?
Yes, it's extremely difficult to find a random name and associated phone number on the internet in this day and age. And if you try, you only find the names and phone numbers of strangers who do exactly what you do. You entirely believe the (second hand, not under oath) word of a guy you didn't know existed until last week, but throw shade on a woman who essentially made her entire life an open book for the past 8 years when she filed the lawsuit.
@originalbluebuddha A woman who brought a bad-faith lawsuit. (Remember, she has never made a wedding website.)
@@johnbriggs3916 - You say bad faith, SCOTUS says good faith and entirely warranted. Sorry it offends you to discover people you don't like have civil rights too.
Agree with you 100 %. I’m a landscape painter and am not good at portraits, so it’s only natural that I don’t paint portraits. I’d be pretty upset if someone tried to force me, legally force me to paint theirs.
Some people seem to constantly be looking for reasons to be offended.
I think you do a great job speaking and explaining things to people, reminds me of my business law professor. So you are not just a great lemon law lawyer.
I thoroughly agree with you and the Supreme Court. Imagine being forced to do a job you do not want.
To the people who are trying to force the action, it's all about control.
@@freethebirds3578 Forcing people to do things is slavery... these same people have been obsessed with slavery for 200 years.
Yeah, imagine having to let black people into your restaurant
Yes, that’s exactly what segregationists used to say. Imagine a restaurant being FORCED to serve customers they do not want.
@@robsemail That is not the same thing and you know it.
The sheer number of people commenting on the previous video saying that people aren't allowed to sue over an unconstitutional law before they get arrested under in was supremely disappointing. That so many people think you aren't allowed to stand up to threats of abuse until you actually get abused just because the abuser is the government is absolutely depressing.
Yeah and SCOTUS has a special solicitude over 1st Amendment pre-enforcement challenges that I think at times has been convoluted but is necessary sadly. Yes you can raise questions of the constitutionality of a statute as part of an attack in criminal court but its a hell of a risk. Federal courts traditionally did not even have federal question jurisdiction or even the ability to enjoin government officials from enforceing unconstitutional laws until Ex parte Young really but you could always bring an action in state court none the less.
In a lot of cases, that's true though. It's not true for 1A violations, but I get why people would think it was.
Expect even more in this video.
@@millitron3666 Just the opposite. 1st Amendment pre-enforcement challenges arguably have less requirements for standing than other types of pre-enforcement challenges. Or at least the courts have come to that conclusion for better or for worse.
@@nateo200 Exactly; 1A doesn't require you to get punished before you can sue.