What a glorious triumph for White Male Christianist Amerika. Given yesterday's Supreme Court rulings from the ruling Conservative Bloc of 5 Republican Men there are no legal impediments to blatant discrimination when it comes to the hiring, promotion or retention of employees who express or embody any religious beliefs, political associations or opinions that are not in lockstep agreement with and supportive of the religious beliefs and political opinions of the ownership and/or management of commercial for-profit entities.
“Religious organizations exist to foster the interests of persons subscribing to the same religious faith. Not so of for-profit corporations. Workers who sustain the operations of those corporations commonly are not drawn from one religious community. Indeed, by law, no religion-based criterion can restrict the work force of for-profit corporations.”
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
(from her scathing dissent to the Hobby Lobby SCOTUS decision)
“If we accepted Illinois’ argument, we would approve an unprecedented violation of the bedrock principle that, except perhaps in the rarest of circumstances, no person in this country may be compelled to subsidize speech by a third party that he or she does not wish to support.”
Justice Samuel Alito
(writing for the Majority (Conservative Bloc of 5 Republican Men)) in Harris v. Quinn
SCOTUS took an outrageous step against (equal) women's rights, setting a dangerous precedent that permits corporations to choose which laws to obey.
Nancy Pelosi (@NancyPelosi) June 30, 2014
I am chilled by what the Conservative Bloc of 5 Republican Men (aka the Supreme Court) are doing to this democracy of ours, that Lincoln referred to as the "last best hope of mankind".
First came the Citizens United decision, where the Conservative Bloc of 5 Republican Men declared that corporations are "people", with the absolute right to ignore campaign finance laws in their exercise of their First Amendment right to political free speech,
Then, along comes Justice Samuel Alito, writing on behalf of the Conservative Bloc of 5 Republican Men in Harris v. Quinn, declaring the "bedrock principle" that "no person in this country may be compelled to subsidize speech by a third party that he or she does not wish to support.”
Alito doesn't say what he means by "no person", but then, he doesn't have to. The Conservative Bloc of 5 Republican Men has already emphatically declared that a corporation is a person when it comes to free speech. With Harris v. Quinn, the Conservative Bloc of 5 Republican Men has expanded the scope of the First Amendment rights of corporations to include "freedom of association".
This immediately puts into jeopardy the 1976 SCOTUS decision of Runyon v. McCrary, the collapse of which would eliminate all legal prohibitions against the right to discriminate on the basis of race in private contracts and the provision of public services.
Additionally, by extension, if "no person (read: corporation) in this country may be compelled to subsidize speech by a third party that he or she does not wish to support.”, and Unions politically and collectively advocate for higher wages and better working conditions in opposition to for-profit corporations, then why should for-profit corporations have to pay wages to employees who actively contribute a portion of those wages to Unions?
The short answer is, they don't. Because as Nancy Pelosi said, the Conservative Bloc of 5 Republican Men took "the outrageous step of... setting a dangerous precedent that permits corporations to choose which laws to obey".
Thirdly, in her powerful dissent to Hobby Lobby, a dissent which will shine like a beacon for many years to come, Justice Ginsburg makes an obvious point. In this country, you don't have to profess the same beliefs as your company owner or corporate manager in order to get a job or keep a job. You can be a Muslim, or an Atheist, or a Methodist who believes in Marriage Equality and that is not grounds for dismissal.
But that is what is imperiled. Why? When the White Male Christianist Amerika oligarchs read Justice Ginsburg's dissent, they think; Workers who sustain the operations of those corporations currently are not drawn from one religious community. Indeed, by the old law, no religion-based criterion could restrict the work force of for-profit corporations. But thanks to the ruling Conservative Bloc of 5 Republican Men, the old laws no longer apply.