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Religious groups if they had a compelling state interest and if they could demonstrate their least restrictive means, the only way they could achieve this aim, was dealing with not a central part of an individual's religion. it was a curious compromise that led sandra day o'connor every time to be voting in favor of stet regulation. the smith case was really scalia's solution. he turned the clock back to the secular regulation rule and allowed for exceptions. that's what we're talking about now, the hobby lobby case, more a question in the larger sense of where individual religious based corpo...

Question of marriage but it is the role and the relationship between the federal government and the states. you know, i have no doubt that there are some on the bench who are activists who believe that they can redefine marriage, definition of marriage with us over 2,500 years. >> what about the legislatures, i guess, and voters, as well? yes, you might say there's activist judges -- >> in those states, you know, you have to understand what i believe. i believe that those states have gone through a process and they have defined their right as a state to define marriage as, you know, between, y...

They call judge-made laws are saying this is horrible because this is really against democracy because the voters of texas actually by referendum adopted this constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. however, we saw the beginning of this in california. we saw it in another federal circuit court in new york. and the wholing was this. the 14th amendment of the united states constitution, which overrides all local constitutions, says if you are going to single out certain people and treat them differently, you better have a really good reason for doing that. and the lawyers call it compelli...

Allow someone in for reason x, then all of a sudden reasons a through z open up. >> again, that's the misinformation. this bill balances the rights of religious freedom against a compelling state interest. all the examples that you cited don't fall into that. >> how is this protecting your religious freedom? >> because if you think somebody should come into your studio to tell you exactly what message you should convey from your microphone? of course not. there's a first amendment right to freedom of press. there's also a first amendment right to freedom of religion. >> that's not the same exa...

Struck by the language of the bill which is so broad. look at this. it's not only, ashleigh, religious beliefs, but whether or not the exercise is compulsory or central to your larger belief system. and so i think it's very broad-based religiously, invites discrimination, and will be declared unconstitutional if it's passed. >> take your plessy versus ferguson -- >> why hasn't it applied to gay rights until now? why hasn't it extended? >> are we talking about the 14th amendment to the constitution, equal protection? it's a very complicated doctrine. what the 14th amendment says is this. if you...