Fifty years ago this week, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling in Newman v. Piggie Park Enterprises.1Piggie Park, a small barbeque chain that is still open today, refused to serve African American customers. The owner, a segregationist, claimed that the Civil Rights Act violated his religious freedom. In a decision handed down on March 18, 1968, the Supreme Court disagreed.This case is an important part of our nation’s Civil Rights history. Yet, the Court is currently considering Masterpiece Cakeshop vs. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, a new case that has the potential to take our country back to a shameful era in our nation’s history where businesses could claim a right to discriminate as they see fit. The stakes of this case couldn’t be higher—not just for LGBT people, but also for people of color, women, minority faiths, people with disabilities, and others.What was the Piggie Park case about? Following the passage of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964, it became illegal to discriminate based on race, ethnicity and other characteristics in employment, housing, and public accommodations such as restaurants. The owner of Piggie Park, a chain of barbeque restaurants in South Carolina, refused service to several patrons because they were Black. In addition to claiming that the restaurant chain was not a place of public accommodation, and thus not covered by the Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the restaurant chain also argued that the Civil Rights Act’s prohibition on discrimination based on race violated the owner’s freedom of religion, because his “religious beliefs compel him to oppose any integration of the races whatever.”2The U.S. Supreme Court resoundingly and swiftly rejected this claim in a ruling issued 50 years ago in March 1968.
