Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/17-1618_hfci.pdf
Page Number: 37

Cite as:  590 U. S. ____ (2020) 

33 

Opinion of the Court 

before  us.  So  while  other  employers  in  other  cases  may 
raise free exercise arguments that merit careful considera-
tion, none of the employers before us today represent in this 
Court that compliance with Title VII will infringe their own 
religious liberties in any way. 

* 

Some of those who supported adding language to Title VII 
to ban sex discrimination may have hoped it would derail
the  entire  Civil  Rights  Act.  Yet,  contrary  to  those  inten-
tions,  the  bill  became  law.    Since  then,  Title  VII’s  effects 
have unfolded with far-reaching consequences, some likely 
beyond what many in Congress or elsewhere expected.

But none of this helps decide today’s cases.  Ours is a so-
ciety of written laws.  Judges are not free to overlook plain 
statutory commands on the strength of nothing more than
suppositions about intentions or guesswork about expecta-
tions.  In Title VII, Congress adopted broad language mak-
ing it illegal for an employer to rely on an employee’s sex 
when deciding to fire that employee.  We do not hesitate to 
recognize today a necessary consequence of that legislative 
choice:  An employer who fires an individual merely for be-
ing gay or transgender defies the law. 

The judgments of the Second and Sixth Circuits in Nos.
17–1623  and  18–107  are  affirmed.    The  judgment  of  the
Eleventh Circuit in No. 17–1618 is reversed, and the case 
is  remanded  for  further  proceedings  consistent  with  this
opinion. 

It is so ordered.