Cinematography Business Forced to Violate Religious Beliefs to Avoid Fines, Jail Time

Minnesota couple Carl and Angel Larsen claim that one of the deepest passions they share is marriage, and so they want to help others see how marriage strengthens bonds of love and commitment. On top of caring for their eight children and managing their involvement in their local church and community, the Larsens decided to establish their own family business, called Telescope Media Group, in 2016. Telescope Media Group is a wedding cinematography business that aims to express the beauty in marriage by filming and producing marriage stories. More specifically, the business’s mission is “to tell great stories through film that magnify Christ like a telescope” by promoting marriage as “a union between one man and one woman that mirrors Christ’s relationship with his Church."

However, Telescope Media Group has not yet publicly entered the wedding media industry. (Click here to see a teaser video of the services they plan to offer). The Minnesota Department of Human Rights claimed that by offering their services to the public, the Larsens would be violating the state’s Human Rights Act. The Act prohibits discrimination based on several protected classes, including religion, sex, marital status, and sexual orientation. The state has interpreted the Act to mean that if the Larsens choose to tell stories about marriage that are consistent with their religious beliefs, then they must also agree to tell stories about marriage that violate their religious beliefs – which would mean producing films about same-sex marriages. Possible fines for violating the Minnesota Human Rights Act include a criminal penalty of up to $1,000, punitive damages of up to $25,000, and up to 90 days in jail. Is it worth following your religious beliefs and placing yourself at risk of such punishments, or is it better to promote something that goes against your religious beliefs for the sake of keeping your business in good standing? Or, should you instead choose not to act on your passion at all and put an end to your business? These are the difficult questions the Larsens had to consider. 

The activist group Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Larsens in December 2016. ADF claimed that by complying with the Minnesota Human Rights Act, the Larsens’ free exercise rights would be violated, and that the message they want to spread about marriage would be contradicted by creating films about same-sex couples. A federal district court reviewed the case and ruled that Minnesota has the power to control the messages expressed in the Larsens’ films, and that the Act does not violate their free exercise or free speech. ADF appealed this ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in the case Telescope Media Group v. Lucero. 

On August 23, 2019, the Eighth Court reversed the decision of the lower court, stating that wedding and marriage videos are a form of speech. Therefore, in compliance with the First Amendment, the Larsens have the right to choose the messages their business spreads, and they are simply exercising their editorial judgment in doing so. 

I agree with the Court’s decision that anti-discrimination laws serve compelling state interests, yet they should not force certain speech upon businesses as a means to publicly accommodate everyone. Similar to how it is impossible to pass laws that accommodate everyone, it is just as difficult to speak in a way that is favorable to each person or group. In delivering its opinion, the Court did not directly address violations of free exercise since “[free exercise] is intertwined with the free speech claim.”  While I think it is difficult to analyze free exercise of religion independently of free speech, I do think we should further emphasize the issue of whether forcing business owners to serve same-sex couples when it goes against their religious beliefs violates the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. This issue is motivated by the Obergefell v. Hodges (2015) case, in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that same-sex couples have a right to marriage by the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. 

Overall, I believe that the Larsens’ free exercise rights are violated by the Minnesota Human Rights Act and its penalties; this stance is primarily supported by the precedent set forth in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission (2018). Masterpiece Cakeshop owner Jack Phillips claimed that decorating cakes is an art form through which he can honor God, and so God would disapprove of Phillips making a cake for a same-sex marriage because this implies that Phillips would be celebrating a same-sex marriage. In a 7-2 decision , the Court ruled that the government must respect a person’s religious belief that marriage is between a man and a woman, and that Phillip’s right to free exercise was violated. We can make a similar argument for Telescope Media Group. Wedding cinematography is indeed an art form, and the Larsens seek to promote marriage “as God designed it,” and so filming about same-sex marriage would be a dishonor to their church since they would be indirectly celebrating a same-sex marriage. This conflicts with Telescope Media Group’s entire purpose and mission.

A key difference between these two situations, however, is that Phillips does not only offer wedding cakes; he offered the same-sex couple other baked goods that did not symbolize their marriage, and so he claimed the business did not discriminate against the same-sex couple. In this context, I do not see there being a way in which Telescope Media Group can offer alternative services to a same-sex couple when the only product being offered is films about opposite-sex marriages. Would this be considered blatant discrimination? While the business may seem to be acting discriminatory, the business owners are not discriminating against the same-sex couples. The decisions regarding what films the business makes pertains to the film’s message, not who is requesting the film. The business owners themselves are not discriminatory; in fact, the Larsens have a 12-foot-long dinner table at which they host dinners with people of all backgrounds and beliefs, and over 1000 people have signed the underside of the table. Although we are talking about the business owners and not the business itself, as was the case with Masterpiece Cakeshop, this case is still supposed by the Masterpiece Cakeshop case since the issue at hand is the owners’ right to free exercise, and not the business’s right.

I cannot deny that a burden is placed upon the denied customers, since they cannot receive a film about their marriage from the business. However, the burden placed upon the Larsens’ free exercise (and free speech) is substantial, as well as the burden to the wedding industry if Telescope Media Group decides not to offer any services at all. I think that the threat of such hefty fines and jail time is an unjust punishment for expressing one’s beliefs through art. In the case Sherbert v. Verner, Seventh-Day Adventist Adeil Sherbert was denied unemployment compensation because she could not work on Saturdays, her day of Sabbath. She was essentially forced to choose between working on Saturdays, which would go against her religious beliefs, or to follow her beliefs and face the substantial burden of unemployment. In this case, the Larsens also face the unjust burden of choosing between their religion and their work, which clearly violates their right to freely exercise their religious beliefs through film.