“This case is an ominous sign.”

That’s the opening salvo of Justice Samuel Alito’s dissent in the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last June not to hear the case of Stormans v. Wiesman. The owners of a Washington pharmacy sought an exemption from the state’s mandate that all pharmacies dispense abortion-inducing drugs. Citing First Amendment protections, the Storman family objected on religious grounds. State and appellate courts disagreed.

“If this is a sign of how religious liberty claims will be treated in the years ahead, those who value religious freedom have cause for great concern,” Alito wrote.

The justice pressed that issue during his May 17 commencement address at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary in Wynnewood, Pa. The school did not have a transcript or recording of the speech but in an interview with seminary student and blog editor Eric Banecker, Alito said America’s founders saw the inextricable link between religion and the “character needed for republican self-government.”

“Our foresighted founders understood that our country could not hold together unless religious freedom was protected,” Alito told Banecker. “What the founders understood more than 200 years ago is just as true today.”

People of faith are rightly concerned they will have to defend their public expressions of faith in court, Alito said. Pointing to his dissent of the Obergefell v. Hodges decision, Alito said he expected the vilification of Americans who do not hold to the “new orthodoxy” of same-sex marriage.

“I assume that those who cling to old beliefs will be able to whisper their thoughts in the recesses of their homes, but if they repeat those views in public, they will risk being labeled as bigots and treated as such by governments, employers, and schools,” he wrote in the Obergefell dissent.

His words proved prophetic. Just one month later, his colleagues declined to hear Stormans v. Wiesman. Alito said he suspected Washington legislators crafted the law requiring pharmacies to carry all FDA approved drugs—including abortifacients—out of animosity for those who would oppose compliance based on religious beliefs.

Alito, who is Catholic, urged the seminary graduates entering the priesthood to “keep the flame” of freedoms in “the hearts of our fellow Americans.”

From Alito’s lips to God’s ears?

Disturbed by the rise of speech-squashing protests on U.S. college campuses, about 25 students from 20 schools gathered at the University of Chicago in April to orchestrate a concerted nationwide response: Students for Freedom of Expression.

The students declared their intention to reclaim American universities’ “original tradition” of free and open discourse by “cultivating a culture where all are free to communicate without fear of censorship or intimidation.” Recent protests on college campuses shut down presentations by invited conservative speakers, effectively silencing debate. Some of those protests turned violent, stoking an atmosphere of intimidation.

The nonpartisan organization has garnered support from Republican and Democratic student groups and in three weeks has collected almost 1,000 signatories to its Statement of Principles. The organization is calling on fellow students to affirm free speech principles and advance them on their respective campuses. —B.P.

Two freedoms baked into one case

Freedom of religion and speech make up the key ingredients of the lawsuit Masterpiece Cakeshop v. The Colorado Civil Rights Commission, now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. Denver-area bakery owner Jack Phillips is still waiting to find out if the high court will hear his case. Phillips declined in 2012 to bake a cake for a gay couple’s wedding celebration. Phillips said his faith compelled him to decline the couple’s order and insists the Constitution protects him from being forced to support what his faith forbids. Phillips’ situation has been repeated in other states, where business owners face crushing fines or closure for refusing to participate in gay weddings. They are looking to Phillips’ case—and the Supreme Court—for relief. —B.P.

A club by any other name

Some public school administrators still don’t get it: Students do not leave their constitutional rights at the school door. For those who need reminding, like Parkland High School in Allentown, Pa., the Thomas More Society stands ready to send a legal notice with remedial lessons on the First Amendment, the Federal Equal Access Act, and—for good measure—the school’s own policy handbook. Parkland High School students jumped through the requisite hoops last fall to launch a pro-life student group, only to have an assistant principal reject the club as “too political” and “controversial.” Those concerns apparently were not an issue for the Gay Straight Alliance Club and the Political Science Club. Thomas More attorneys sent administrators a letter May 17 demanding a reversal of their decision. Other public schools that have tried to similarly censor pro-life groups reversed course after receiving their own legal warning letters. —B.P.