SAN FRANCISCO — California's highest court considered this week whether doctors' religious beliefs give them the right to withhold medical treatment from lesbians and gay men, a group specifically protected under state anti-discrimination laws.
Taking up a case that has pitted the promise of religious liberty against the guarantee of equal access, the state Supreme Court heard oral arguments May 28 in a lawsuit brought by a woman who claims her Christian doctors refused to perform artificial insemination on her because of her sexual orientation.
Guadalupe Benitez, 36, of Oceanside, alleges that doctors at the only nearby medical practice covered by her insurance treated her with fertility drugs and instructed her how to inseminate herself at home, but told her their beliefs prevented them from assisting her further.
"Doctors have the freedom, and rightly so, to pick their field and offer whatever procedures and protocols are appropriate for them," Jennifer Pizer, Benitez's lawyer, told the justices. "They do not have the freedom to discriminate against patients."
Benitez, now the mother of a 6-year-old boy and 2-year-old twin girls, sued Vista-based North Coast Women's Care Medical Group under a state law that prohibits for-profit businesses from arbitrarily discriminating against clients.
The law was originally designed to prevent hotels, restaurants and other public services from refusing to serve patrons because of their race. The Legislature has since expanded it to cover characteristics such as age and sexual orientation.
Kenneth Pedroza, a lawyer for the North Coast doctors, said the court must recognize a solution that respects the right of gay men and lesbians to be treated with dignity and the right of doctors to honor their moral views.
The doctors attempted to strike that balance, according to Pedroza, by being up front with Benitez about their views and referring her to another fertility specialist who did not object to performing in-office insemination on lesbians and eventually helped Benitez get pregnant through in-vitro fertilization.
"The law should not allow one side's rights to trump the other side," Pedroza said. "The law should accommodate both sides."
Associate Justice Carol Corrigan appeared skeptical, however, asking Pedroza whether a pharmacist who refuses to sell medicine "to people like you" but gives a customer cab fare to another pharmacy would be acting legally.
"At the end of the day, you are saying that I may help a patient get the services, (but) I am not going to do it for you because of who you are," Corrigan said.
Associate Justice Kathryn Werdegar asked Pizer why North Coast's attempt to find her a doctor without reservations about inseminating her was "not an accommodation of what we know is very important — religious freedom — and the accommodation of a person's right to be free from discrimination?"
Pizer, who several times asked the justices to consider whether a doctor would be allowed to invoke religion in denying treatment to patients of certain races, said that scenario would create a segregated medical system that discouraged people from seeking care.
"California doesn't allow doctors to become a whites-only doctor, or a heterosexual-only or a Jewish-only doctor," Pizer elaborated outside court.
Benitez, who attended the hearing with her partner, Joanne Clark, agreed. She said that besides suffering the additional stress of not knowing who would perform the procedure and the indignity of being turned away, the referral to a doctor not covered by her insurance cost her thousands of dollars in out-of-pocket expenses. North Coast claims the clinic offered to pay the extra costs of sending her to another doctor.
"It does do a great deal of damage to a person when you tell them they aren't worthy of having a child or having a family," she said.
Pedroza also predicted an unwelcome outcome if the justices side with Benitez.
"Physicians that have a conscientious objection ... will stop performing a medical procedure," he said. "It's not a minor imposition. It's a major imposition."
The court has 90 days to issue its opinion in the case, which Pizer said would have to be sent back to a trial court for a determination of whether the facts of the case support Benitez's discrimination claim. The Supreme Court is addressing the narrower issue of whether a doctor's religious views can be used as a defense.