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WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court has agreed to hear the challenge of free speech to laws in Colorado, California and 20 other states.
State lawmakers, which began in California in 2012, banned “conversion therapy” for ineffective and harmful reasons. They said these treatments have increased the rates of depression, anxiety and suicide.
However, the judge voted to hear a first amendment request from Caylee Chile, a licensed Colorado counselor who argued that the law violated her rights to free speech and freedom of religion.
She said that clients “seeking Christian-based counseling to reduce or eliminate unwanted sexual attraction, change sexual behavior, and develop experiences of physical and harmony.”
She says she doesn’t want to “convert” or “cure” her younger clients, but she insists that the state may not “censor” their conversations.
The appeal was brought by the Freedom of Alliance Defendants, a Christian legal group that won a Supreme Court decision on behalf of cake makers and website designers who refused to engage in wedding efforts for same-sex couples.
If the court breaks Colorado law, the ruling will almost certainly break similar laws in California and elsewhere.
The new cases will test whether “special speech” will be subject to strict state regulations.
The judge upheld laws in California and Colorado against “conversion therapy” by determining that the state has a wide range of power to regulate medical and medical practices. This includes licensing and malpractice laws that can result in the possibility of being punished by a physician or other medical professional for providing risky or highly inappropriate treatment recommendations.
A Colorado lawyer defended the law and said that Christian legal appeals would argue that “patient mental health professional counseling is no different from chatting with a university roommate.
Counselors who violate the law may be fined or lose their license. The state said the law “does not apply to people who provide services outside of the professional medical context, such as ministers of religion or life coaches.”
A Colorado lawyer urged the court to confirm the view that “the first amendment allows the first amendment to reasonably regulate professional conduct to protect patients from substandard care, even if the regulations coincidentally burden the speech.”
But conservatives led by Judge Clarence Thomas say the state uses these laws to implement its own views.
“There’s a fierce public debate about how best to support minors with gender discomfort,” Thomas said, and the state “silenced one side of this debate.”
He opposed two years ago when the court rejected a similar free-speak challenge to Washington’s “conversion therapy” law, along with judges Samuel A. Alito and Brett M. Kavanaugh.
“A licensed counselors can talk to minors about gender discomfort, but only if they convey a state-approved message that encourages minors to explore their gender identity. Expressing other messages is prohibited — even if the counselor’s clients ask for help in accepting their biological sex,” Thomas said.
You need at least four votes to hear the appeal. This suggests that one or more justices agree with Thomas.
The court will hear the argument in the case of Chile and Salazar in the fall.
Still pending before the court is a parallel dispute over state laws that restrict the handling of gender discomfort.
Tennessee and 23 Republican-led states recently adopted laws that prohibit doctors from prescribing adolescent blockers or hormones for minors with gender discomfort.
The Biden administration sued, sought the state and engaged in unconstitutional discrimination based on gender identity.
But when a judge heard the case in December, conservatives in the court said they tended to support Tennessee law.
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