Per the article: Finally, the court declined to address whether occupational discrimination is covered by the Unruh Act
The CA SC didn't address that..
our opinion does not preclude Square from disputing White’s factual allegations. ... Nor do we express any view on whether a defendant violates the Act by discriminating on the basis of occupation or on White’s adequacy as a representative for a class of bankruptcy attorneys excluded from Square’s services. The question of an individual plaintiff’s standing under the Unruh Civil Rights Act is distinct from the question of that plaintiff’s ability to serve as a representative for a class of allegedly aggrieved individuals.[0]
White only won standing to bring his case. He's still prohibited from using Square; and he needs to win his case against Square before that'll change.
0. https://law.justia.com/cases/california/supreme-court/2019/s...
http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2018/06/07/16...
> California Courts of Appeal have interpreted this reference to mean that the Unruh Act prohibits arbitrary occupational discrimination. Sisemore v. Master Fin., Inc.,151 Cal. App. 4th 1386,1405–06 (2007); Long v. Valentino, 216 Cal. App. 3d 1287,1297 (1989).
I always get frustrated when companies arbitrarily decide they don't want certain industries (alcohol or firearms or porn).
But forcing all companies to take every comer on the same terms seems a bit extreme. I freelance in IT. I would want more money or would downright refuse certain jobs on moral grounds (I wouldn't work with the Saudi government at any price). Am I being unreasonable in that?
You should have every right to deny service to them and the law supports you on that.
> Indeed, the basic rights guaranteed by section 51 would be drastically undermined if, as the landlord contends, a business enterprise could exclude from its premises or services entire classes of the public simply because the owner of the enterprise had some reason to believe that the class, taken as a whole, might present greater problems than other groups. Under such an approach, for example, members of entire occupations or avocations, e.g., sailors or motorcyclists, might find themselves excluded as a class from some places of public accommodation simply because the proprietors could show that, as a statistical matter, members of their occupation or avocation were more likely than others to be involved in a disturbance. (See, e.g., Atwater v. Sawyer (1884) 76 Me. 539 [49 Am.Rep. 634] (innkeeper's exclusion of all members of the militia, because of disorderly conduct of other militiamen, held impermissible).) Similarly, members of a particular nationality or ethnic group might be excluded from an apartment complex simply because the landlord had found from his experience that members of that nationality or ethnic group were more likely to play [30 Cal. 3d 740] loud music or to damage the landlord's property than tenants of other backgrounds.
> As these examples demonstrate, the exclusion of individuals from places of public accommodation or other business enterprises covered by the Unruh Act on the basis of class or group affiliation basically conflicts with the individual nature of the right afforded by the act of access to such enterprises.
(emphasis added)
https://law.justia.com/cases/california/supreme-court/3d/30/...