ARIZONA And "Ax Handle" Maddox

 

Solomon was right: There is nothing new under the sun.

The recent flap over a proposed Arizona law that would allow business owners to refuse service to a specific class of potential customers was a fight most recently fought in 1965 when the battle was famously joined in Atlanta GA.

As most readers of this blog are too young to remember Ax Handle Maddox I encourage you to visit the link and read the entire entry.

Lester Garfield Maddox, a/k/a Ax Handle, and his wife, Hattie Virginia Cox, owned the Pickrick Restaurant. A staunch segregationist, Maddox refused to serve blacks, even following passage of the "Civil Rights Act of 1964." The Act's purpose, according to the preamble, was: To enforce the constitutional right to vote, to confer jurisdiction upon the district courts of the United States to provide injunctive relief against discrimination in public accommodations, to authorize the attorney General to institute suits to protect constitutional rights in public facilities and public education, to extend the Commission on Civil Rights, to prevent discrimination in federally assisted programs, to establish a Commission on Equal Employment Opportunity, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That this Act may be cited as the “Civil Rights Act of 1964”.

There is a film clip, titled "WSB-TV news film clip of Lester Maddox pushing African Americans away from his cafeteria with an ax handle, Atlanta, Georgia, 1965 January 29" available in the University of Georgia's Civil Rights Digital Library.

Now - in 20113 we encounter Barronelle Stutzman, the owner of Arlene's Flowers in Richland WA, refusing to sell flowers for a gay couple's wedding. There was no suggestion that the flower shop engaged in "public accommodations," but the refusal apparently violated Washington's Consumer Protection Act. According to State Attorney General Bob Ferguson, "Under the Consumer Protection Act, it is unlawful to discriminate against customers on the basis of sexual orientation. If a business provides a product or service to opposite-sex couples for their weddings, then it must provide same-sex couples the same product or service."

As an aside, the man who ordered the flowers (for his same-sex wedding) was "a long-time customer" suggesting that the man's sexual preference was OK as long as it did not conflict with the flower shop owner's personal philosophy.

A counter suit  filed by an anti-gay-marriage group called Alliance Defending Freedom, argues that Ferguson’s suit is attempting to force Barronelle Stutzman to act contrary to her religious convictions in violation of her freedoms under the state constitution.

“In America, the government is supposed to protect freedom, not use its intolerance for certain viewpoints to intimidate citizens into acting contrary to their faith convictions. Family business owners are constitutionally guaranteed the freedom to live and work according to their beliefs,” said Dale Schowengerdt, senior legal counsel with the Arizona-based group.

Now we come to Arizona.

Given the history of anti-discrimination laws in the United States and that fact that almost without exception the government prevails, why would anyone want to propose a law that would protect a business owner's rights?

In any event, there are no "states rights" - all have been trampled by Washington's boots; no state law is inviolate when the Federal government decides to over-ride it.

MY PROBLEM is that a business should be able to decide to whom to cater ON THE CONDITION THAT THERE ARE ALTERNATE BUSINESSES OFFERING THE SAME PRODUCTS within a reasonable distance from the rejected customer.

Dress codes are "tolerated" (See City drops suit against some Jewish shop owners over dress codes, but what let's consider a Satmar who owns a restaurant. Well inside the Satmar ghetto so that his customers are almost exclusively from his sect. Now, in walks a non-Satmar. A man either sans a kippa or, heaven forbid, with a knit kippa (which the Council of Sages claim makes the person "non-Jewish").

The restaurant owner tells the non-Satmar gentleman he has to don a kippa in order to be served. "I'm Reform and we don't wear kippot; I won't wear one and you will serve me."

(Yes, I know, the kippa-less gentleman undoubtedly knew what would happen before he wandered into the ghetto.)

The Satmar will contend that the kippa is part of the establishment's dress code. The owner probably will point out other eating establishments just outside the ghetto that will gladly serve the non-Satmar customer want-to-be.

But, never mind the owner's sensitivities; never mind the sensitivities of the other customers, never mind the availability of other restaurants within the area, the government will step in and force the restaurant to feed the bare headed man.

It used to be that your rights ended at the tip of my nose. I think we have sacrificed individual rights on the alter of political correctness.

If homosexuals want to form sanctioned liaisons, fine, but please don't call it "marriage." If non-Jews want to eat at a kosher restaurant, likewise fine; let it be a restaurant with a mix of observant (kippa-wearing) and non-observant (no kippot) clientele.

As a young man I applied for a job with several business that refused to hire me because I had - and still have - a beard. Their loss. Should I have gone to the Feds and complained? Today, in the U.S. Air Force, Jews must sue to wear a kippa (not so in the other services; why that is so is beyond my ken).

Again, if I have the only business of its type within, say, a 50-mile radius, I should expect, and be willing, to welcome all potential customers. On the other hand, if my business is one of many offering the same product or service, I should be allowed to select my customers, especially if my trade would disappear because one or two individuals refuse to conform the my establishment's norms .