Liberty Minute April 11

Elane Huguenin, a wedding photographer from New Mexico, was arraigned before that state?s ?human rights? soviet for politely declining to provide her services to a lesbian couple planning a ?commitment ceremony.?

The couple had no difficulty finding another photographer willing to accept payment for that service. Thanks to their punitive impulses ? and the totalitarian ?public accommodations? law in that state ? they were able to use money extracted from Huguenin in the form of fines in order to pay for their photographs.

In declining the couple?s business, Elane Huguenin did not injure or defraud anybody. The same is true of Antonio Darden, a gay hairdresser from Santa Fe who earned nation-wide publicity a couple of years ago when he announced that he would not accept business from New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez because she is an opponent of same-sex marriage.

Both Huguenin and Darden sought to exercise their property rights by declining proposed business transactions. Only Darden was permitted to do so, because he ? unlike Huguenin ? belongs to a ?specially protected? class, one that can compel others to provide services to them.

The US Supreme Court has declined Hugeunin?s appeal, tacitly ratifying involuntary servitude in the name of ?tolerance.? 

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.