As
previously reported, earlier this month the Department of Justice filed an
amicus brief in the Supreme Court in
Masterpiece Cakeshop, Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, siding with the Christian bakery owner who refused to design and create a cake for a same-sex wedding. Last week
National Law Journal reported that the Department was divided on whether to file an
amicus brief, although a Justice Department spokesperson denied the report.The paper says:
Senior lawyers in the civil and civil rights divisions and within the U.S. solicitor general’s office said the department should not take a position in the case...
[Acting Solicitor General Jeffrey] Wall was the lead attorney among what former Justice Department lawyers said was an unusually large group of attorneys—eight in all—whose names appeared on the cover of the court filing....
Absent from the government’s Masterpiece Cakeshop brief was any career deputy solicitor general, whose name routinely appears on amicus and merits filings from the Justice Department.
