| 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Argued December 5, 2022 Decided June 30, 2023 | |
| Full case name | 303 Creative LLC, et al. v. Aubrey Elenis, et al. |
| Docket no. | 21-476 |
| Citations | 600 U.S. 570 (more) |
| Argument | Oral argument |
| Opinion announcement | Opinion announcement |
| Case history | |
| Prior | 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, 385 F. Supp. 3d 1147 (D. Colo. 2019). Aff’d, 6 F.4th 1160 (10th Cir. 2021). |
| Questions presented | |
| Whether applying a public-accommodation law to compel an artist to speak or stay silent violates the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment. | |
| Holding | |
| The First Amendment prohibits Colorado from forcing a website designer to create expressive designs speaking messages with which the designer disagrees. United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit reversed. | |
| Court membership | |
| |
| Case opinions | |
| Majority | Gorsuch, joined by Roberts, Thomas, Alito, Kavanaugh, Barrett |
| Dissent | Sotomayor, joined by Kagan, Jackson |
| Laws applied | |
| U.S. Const. amend. I, Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act | |
303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, 600 U.S. 570 (2023), is a United States Supreme Court decision that dealt with the intersection of anti-discrimination law in public accommodations with the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. In a 6–3 decision, the Court found for a website designer, ruling that the state of Colorado cannot compel the designer to create work that violates her values. The case follows from Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, 584 U.S. 617 (2018), which had dealt with similar conflict between free speech rights and Colorado's anti-discrimination laws but had been decided on narrower grounds.
Both Masterpiece Cakeshop and 303 Creative involved questions of whether a U.S. state's anti-discrimination laws can require designers to create works that recognize same-sex marriages, when same-sex marriage conflicts with those designers' beliefs. The decision in 303 Creative was seen by some as a victory for free speech rights as well as religious liberty and by others as a setback for LGBT rights and an assertion of discrimination as a type of free speech.