OPINION:
Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson and the ACLU are bringing suit against a woman who sells flowers for a living (“Wash. state attorney general sues florist for refusing to supply flowers to a same-sex wedding,” Web, April 11). For years, she has sold flowers to two men who happen to be homosexual. The men asked her to do the floral arrangements for their upcoming same-sex union, but she declined, stating that her conscience, morals and religious beliefs did not allow her to participate actively in such an event.
For most Americans steeped in our basic values of liberty, this would be a no-brainer. The ACLU and the state authorities should be passionately defending this woman; instead, they are attacking her. The attack is one focused on the heart of our American values system. America is in a cultural war as deep and passionate as the Civil War. It is nonviolent, but just as important. It is not between Democrats and Republicans. It is between the values of leftism and America. Leftism is deeply entrenched in such organizations as the ACLU and now in state and federal governments. American values, on the other hand, hold that liberty, religious freedom and freedom of conscience are supreme.
All that also includes the liberty of a homosexual florist not to be coerced by government to work for, say, a “Keep Marriage Between a Man and a Woman” convention of evangelical Christians. It includes the liberty of a pro-choice photographer to decline to work for a Catholic pro-life conference. Leftism clashes daily with liberalism. That is what all this is about.
HOWARD SACHS
Washington
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