LANSING, Mich. (Michigan News Source) –  The Michigan Supreme Court has decided, in a 5-2 decision, that the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act of 1976 protects sexual orientation.

The decision came after a lawsuit was filed in 2020 by two businesses who had denied service to LGBTQ individuals based on their own religious beliefs.

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An action was brought to the Court of Claims against the Department of Civil Rights, arguing that the civil rights law did not bar discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

The Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act is “an act to define civil rights; to prohibit discriminatory practices, policies, and customs in the exercise of those rights based upon religion, race, color, national origin,
age, sex, height, weight, familial status, or marital status…”

Justice Elizabeth Clement wrote in the court decision, “Discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation necessarily constitutes discrimination because of sex.”

How the word “sex” is defined is at the heart of the matter because it was not defined in the 1976 legislation, perhaps because the legislators thought the word was self-explanatory as meaning a gender.

Although the Michigan Supreme Court has decided that sexual orientation is covered in the civil rights law, 16 democrat legislators and one republican didn’t feel the same way in 2021 when they wrote Senate Bill 0208, adding sexual orientation to the paragraph so it read “rights based upon religion, race, color, national origin, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression…”

There is other evidence that in Michigan government, outside of the Michigan Supreme Court, the word “sex” is defined as a term for gender.

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There are Michigan forms, such as the application for food assistance (FAP), that clearly show that the answer to the question “sex” are requiring an answer of gender – “male” or “female.”

On the voter registration application, voters can choose between male, female and non-binary. The directions state that a person’s name and “sex” designation changes must be completed at the Secretary of State office, showing that gender is the accepted answer to their question about a person’s sex.

With the court’s decision, the justices added an identity right not defined in the civil rights law and seemingly ignored the religious basis of the 2020 lawsuit.