Is Cake an Artistic Medium? The Supreme Court Will Decide This Fall

There's a yellowing newspaper article hanging on the wall of Jack Phillips's bakery, from shortly after he first opened up shop in 1993. Aside from the Lakewood paper offering up a positive review, Phillips was pleased that the reporter seemed to get exactly what he was trying to do—the article calls the place “an art gallery of cakes.”

“The name is Masterpiece Cakeshop. I thought of that when we first opened up that masterpiece, to me, it indicates art,” Phillips tells the WEEKLY STANDARD. “Then we have a logo, its got a paintbrush, then a pallet, and a french whip for cooking so it incorporates art and cooking.”

Phillips seems genuinely confused, and more than a little bit hurt, about what has happened to him since 2012. Anyone who's met Phillips will tell you that he's an exceedingly gentle soul; he speaks so softly it's hard to hear him seated just a few feet away. Phillips is a devout Christian and his faith has lead to him being sanctioned by the Colorado Civil Rights Commission for refusing to make specialty cakes for gay weddings. (At the time Phillips first came under fire for refusing to make a cake for a gay couple's ceremony, gay marriage was not yet legal in the state, and a declaration that marriage was only between one man and one woman was enshrined in the Centennial State's constitution.)

It matters not to the CCRC that his refusal to provide custom cakes for ceremonies of religious significance that he objects to isn't unique to gay weddings. Over the years, Phillips has refused to make cakes celebrating divorce. Phillips is so committed to his faith he doesn't make anything for Halloween, nor does he bake cakes with alcohol in them. And it’s not just about religious doctrine: He turned down one customer who wanted him to make a cake telling off his boss. He's fielded multiple requests to make cakes with derogatory messages about homosexuality, which Phillips has refused as mean and uncharitable. Whether it's Augustine's writings about the distinctions Between the City of God and the City of Man or Martin Luther's Doctrine of Vocation, Christian teaching has been clear for more than 2,000 two thousand years that one cannot can not disregard fundamental beliefs as a consequence of being in the public square.

He now finds himself at the center of a Supreme Court case that will be heard this fall—Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission—that will determine whether Phillips has the right to refuse service based on his right to be considered an artist.