By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Journalist
The ink has barely dried on a new civil unions law in Illinois and a same-sex couple is already suing two bed and breakfast establishments for refusing to rent space for their civil ceremony.
The Chicago Tribune is reporting that Todd and Mark Walthen were planning a civil union ceremony for June of this year and were told by the owners of two bed and breakfasts near their home that they were not willing to host a same-sex ceremony.
The Walthens were told via-mail by the Beall Mansion in Alton that it “will just be doing traditional weddings.” The owner of the Timber Creek Bed and Breakfast in Paxton was more explicit. “We will never host same-sex civil unions,” the owner wrote in an e-mail. “We will never host same-sex weddings even if they become legal in Illinois. We believe homosexuality is wrong and unnatural based on what the Bible says about it. If that is discrimination, I guess we unfortunately discriminate.”
Todd Walthen claimed the treatment “took an event we had looked forward to for years and ruined it.”
The Walthens’ ceremony took place in their backyard shortly after the law took effect in June.
As a result, the couple has now filed a complaint with the Illinois Department of Human Rights, which investigated and found “substantial evidence” that a civil rights violation had been committed.
The Walthens’ attorney, Betty Tsamis of Chicago, told the Tribune that her clients will file lawsuits against both businesses as early as this week.
Should the case be allowed to proceed, it will force a showdown between state guaranteed rights to religious freedom and discrimination based on sexual orientation which violates the state’s Human Rights laws.
Steven Amjad, an attorney representing Timber Creek, said the state constitution guarantees religious freedoms. “These are business owners that have strong religious convictions. The Legislature has created this (conflict), and the courts will have to sort this out,” he said.
Andrew Koppelman, a professor of political science and law at Northwestern University, told the Tribune the question is whether or not the state’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act — which protects religious freedoms from government intrusion — can trump the state’s Human Rights Act, which includes the protection of people based on sexual orientation.
“The hotels seem pretty clearly in violation of the Human Rights Act,” Koppelman said. “And if you’re going to say that somebody is exempted from the human rights law under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, that would mean that people could discriminate based on religious views. It’s a slippery slope.”
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