"Supreme Court limits birth control coverage rule; 5-4 ruling lets family-owned firms decline for religious reasons" by Tracy Jan | Globe Staff July 01, 2014
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Monday that family-owned businesses are not required to provide birth control coverage to their employees if it conflicts with the business owners’ religious beliefs, a case that extended religious protections to for-profit corporations for the first time.
The ruling was a major victory for social conservatives, who objected to the requirement in President Obama’s health care law that businesses providing insurance to their employees must pay for coverage of contraceptives. The justices said businesses owned by individuals or families should not have to follow those particular government rules.
The whole debate is about who pays for birth control.
“A corporation is simply a form of organization used by human beings to achieve desired ends,” Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. wrote. “When rights, whether constitutional or statutory, are extended to corporations, the purpose is to protect the rights of these people. . . . And protecting the free-exercise rights of corporations . . . protects the religious liberty of the humans who own and control those companies.”
The 5-to-4 ruling drew a blistering dissent from liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who called it “a decision of startling breadth.”
Ginsburg, reflecting the sharp divisions over the ruling, objected to “the court’s expansive notion of corporate personhood,” saying it raised a host of new questions about the ability of corporations to use the shield of religious faith to protect themselves against federal laws they find distasteful.
The companies that brought the lawsuit — Hobby Lobby, an Oklahoma City-based arts and craft chain, and Conestoga, a furniture maker in East Pearl, Pa., — “surely do not stand alone’’ in their desire to avoid laws that conflict with religion, Ginsburg wrote.
Posing a series of scenarios, Ginsburg asked if the court’s decision would “extend to employers with religiously grounded objections to blood transfusions (Jehovah’s Witnesses); antidepressants (Scientologists); medications derived from pigs, including anesthesia, intravenous fluids, and pills coated with gelatin (certain Muslims, Jews, and Hindus); and vaccinations (Christian Scientists, among others)?”
Now I see why the Scientologists and Christian Scientists are made fun of.
Ginsburg also pointed to cases where companies, citing their religious beliefs, have discriminated against black or homosexual patrons, female employees working without their father’s or husband’s consent, and couples living together without being married — and asked “how does the court divine which religious beliefs are worthy of accommodation, and which are not?”
But the justices in the conservative majority took pains to blunt the political impact of their decision. They insisted the case applies only to “closely held’’ companies, not those controlled by shareholders or large groups of investors.
Alito, writing for the majority, said it was intended to be narrowly interpreted. The decision, he said, would not allow racial discrimination in hiring under the shield of religious practice. Nor, he said, would it apply to other medical procedures such as vaccinations and blood transfusions.
You are still going to have to take the needle.
“Our decision in these cases is concerned solely with the contraceptive mandate,” Alito wrote. “Our decision should not be understood to hold that an insurance-coverage mandate must necessarily fall if it conflicts with an employer’s religious beliefs.”
But Mark Tushnet, a Harvard law professor, said it is quite possible that when a Christian Scientist or Jehovah’s Witness raises the objections Ginsburg brought forth, they will prevail. Alito said in the opinion such plaintiffs would not prevail, but the underlying points in the case indicate they could, Tushnet said.
The debate over expanding religious protections for corporations echoed to some extent the court’s 2010 ruling in Citizens United, which reinforced First Amendment speech rights for corporations seeking to spend money to influence political elections. This case, however, turned on the expansion of a religious freedom law that Congress passed in 1993 to include corporations, not the constitutional right to freedom of religion.
Even the courts are under corporate control.
The court said that the government is required by the Religions Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 to provide closely held corporations — those under the control of just a handful of people — with the same accommodations it already gives nonprofit organizations such as religious universities, hospitals, and charities who object to the contraceptive mandate on religious grounds.
The lawsuit against the federal government was brought by two companies.
Hobby Lobby employs more than 13,000 workers in more than 500 stores. It is owned by the Green family, evangelical Christians who also own Mardel, a Christian bookstore chain. The second plaintiff, Conestoga Wood Specialties, is owned by the Hahns, a Mennonite family, and employs 950 people.
Obama’s health care law requires company insurance plans to provide free access to 20 contraceptive methods that have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood objected to having to cover two types of emergency contraceptive pills and two types of IUDs that they liken to abortion.
If the owners of the companies comply with the mandate, “they believe they will be facilitating abortions, and if they do not comply, they will pay a very heavy price — as much as $1.3 million per day, or about $475 million per year, in the case of one of the companies,” Alito wrote.
In trying to carve out a narrow exemption, the majority said the Obama administration could pay for the disputed forms of contraceptive coverage, if it chose. Forcing employers to pay for coverage was not the “least restrictive’’ option, they said.
Alito was joined in the majority opinion by fellow justices Anthony M. Kennedy, Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, and Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. The court’s four liberal justices — Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan — dissented.
The closely watched decision, released just before the court adjourns for the summer, was widely hailed by Christian groups and decried by women’s health groups.
“Today’s decision reassures Americans that they don’t have to check their religious freedoms at the door just because they own a business,” said Andrew Beckwith, president of the Massachusetts Family Institute, a Woburn-based Christian nonprofit.
Dwight Duncan, a UMass Dartmouth constitutional law professor who filed an amicus brief siding with Hobby Lobby on behalf of several organizations including the Massachusetts Family Institute, said he expects other religiously owned companies “will come forward and say, ‘Me too.’ ”
Democrats in Washington, however, objected, though some analysts said they may benefit because it will energize their base, especially women voters.
“This ruling by an all-male majority of the Court diminishes the rights of women in the workplace and sets a dangerous precedent that could lead to corporations denying coverage of other important health care services,’’ said Representative Niki Tsongas, Democrat of Lowell.
The White House said Monday it is still assessing the court’s decision and its legal implications, but will seek to work with Congress to prevent a loss of birth control access for women at companies with religious owners.
There is no law or ruling these guys will disobey, is there?
“The Supreme Court ruled today that some bosses can now withhold contraceptive care from their employees’ health coverage based on their own religious views that their employees may not even share,” said Josh Earnest, White House press secretary, in a press briefing.
--more--"
"Religious exemption to hiring rule urged; Bias on sexual orientation at issue’ Gordon College leader joins request" by Evan Allen | Globe Staff July 04, 2014
The president of a small Christian college north of Boston was among 14 religious leaders who sent a letter to the White House this week requesting a religious exemption to a planned order barring federal contractors from discriminating in hiring on the basis of sexual orientation.
“Without a robust religious exemption . . . this expansion of hiring rights will come at an unreasonable cost to the common good, national unity and religious freedom,” reads the letter, signed by Gordon College president D. Michael Lindsay as well as the chief executive of Catholic Charities USA, the executive editor of Christianity Today, prominent evangelical pastor Rick Warren, and other Christian leaders.
The letter was sent Tuesday, a day after the US Supreme Court issued a ruling providing a religious exemption in another area, deciding that family-owned businesses are not required to provide birth control to employees if it conflicts with their religious beliefs. Organizers said the letter was in the works before the Supreme Court ruling. The letter drew sharp criticism from Gordon alumni and students.
Lindsay “has made Gordon a fortress of faith rather than a place where the doors are open to people who want to be part of a conversation about what it means to be a Christian,” said Paul Miller, 29, a co-founder of LGBTQ organization OneGordon who graduated from Gordon in 2008 and worked for the school for three years before leaving because he could not come out as gay while there. “He thinks it’s important that it’s encoded into law that institutions be able to discriminate.”
Some students are planning to send their own letter to the White House supporting LGBT rights....
He is already with you.
--more--"
Related:
Gordon College president defends call for religious exemption
Gordon College pleads for right to discriminate
Why would gay people be worried about birth control?
"New contraception ruling draws female justices’ ire" by Adam Liptak | New York Times July 04, 2014
WASHINGTON — In a decision that drew an unusually fierce dissent from the three female justices, the Supreme Court sided Thursday with religiously affiliated nonprofit groups in a clash between religious freedom and women’s rights.
The decision temporarily exempts a Christian college from part of the regulations that provide contraception coverage under the Affordable Care Act.
The court’s order was brief, provisional, and unsigned, but it drew a furious reaction from the three female members — justices Sonia Sotomayor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Elena Kagan. The order, Sotomayor wrote, was at odds with the court’s 5-4 decision Monday in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, which involved for-profit corporations.
“Those who are bound by our decisions usually believe they can take us at our word,” Sotomayor wrote. “Not so today.”
The court’s action, she added, “undermines confidence in this institution.”
Monday’s decision and the order Thursday were dual blows to the Obama administration’s efforts to provide contraception coverage, said Walter Dellinger, who was acting US solicitor general in the Clinton administration.
“Before the Hobby Lobby ruling, women had guaranteed contraceptive coverage as part of their employment health insurance,” he said. “After today, it is clear that their access to contraception is by no means guaranteed given the administrative complexities the court has now imposed upon” the Department of Health and Human Services.
Sotomayor said the majority had not only introduced pointless complexity into an already byzantine set of regulations, but it had also revised its Hobby Lobby decision.
That decision, Sotomayor said, endorsed an arrangement allowing nonprofit groups to sign a form that would transfer the delivery of free contraception under the Affordable Care Act to others. But Thursday’s order rejected the mandatory use of the forms for Wheaton College in Illinois.
Sotomayor said the ruling reached beyond Wheaton and could lead to similar results at many other nonprofit religious organizations that have similar concerns. “The issuance of an injunction in this case will presumably entitle hundreds or thousands of other objectors to the same remedy,” she said.
Mark L. Rienzi, a lawyer at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which represents Wheaton, said, “The court rightly recognized that Wheaton’s religious community should be allowed to practice its faith free from crushing government fines.”
The majority opinion in the Hobby Lobby case on Monday, written by Justice Samuel Alito, seemed to suggest that the forms could play a role in an arrangement that was an acceptable alternative to having employers pay for the coverage.
On Thursday, the court’s majority said all Wheaton had to do was notify the government in writing “that it is a nonprofit organization that holds itself out as religious and has religious objections to covering coverage for contraception services.”
--more--"
"Free birth control represents major shift in health care" by Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar | Associated Press July 05, 2014
WASHINGTON — Most privately insured women are getting free birth control under President Obama’s health law, a major coverage shift that’s likely to continue.
This week the Supreme Court allowed some employers with religious scruples to opt out, but most companies appear to be going in the opposite direction.
Then why all the furor?
**************
The average annual saving for women was $269. ‘‘It’s a big number,’’ said IMS Institute director Michael Kleinrock. The institute is the research arm of IMS Health, a Connecticut-based technology company that uses pharmacy records to track prescription drug sales.
Nothing like bank bonuses, but you know.
I can't believe they are arguing so vociferously over about $5 a week.
The core of Obama’s law — taxpayer-subsidized coverage for the uninsured — benefits a relatively small share of Americans.
That's what the core was?
But free preventive care — from flu shots to colonoscopies — is a dividend of sorts for the majority with employer coverage.
Expanded preventive coverage hasn’t gotten as much attention as another bonus for the already insured: the provision that allows young adults to remain on their parents’ policy until they turn 26. That may start to change with all the discussion of birth control.
Also not getting much attention:
Reports find deficiencies in health care law enrollments
Was a one-day wonder.
Business groups and employee benefits consultants say they see little chance that employers will roll back contraceptive coverage as a result of the Supreme Court ruling. The court carved out a space for ‘‘closely held’’ companies whose owners object on religious grounds. Most companies don’t fit that niche.
Meaning all this is a ginned-up issue generated for distraction.
‘‘I don’t think you will see a broad impact,’’ said Neil Trautwein, the top employee benefits expert for the National Retail Federation. ‘‘It’s a commonly offered benefit for many employers, including retailers.’’
The court decision involved ‘‘a very unique set of facts,’’ Trautwein added. ‘‘Intense religious beliefs, closely held companies, and the vehement objection to contraceptive coverage.’’
Before the Supreme Court ruling, some ‘‘grandfathered’’ plans unchanged since the health care law passed were already exempt from covering prevention at no cost, but that number is expected to shrink over time as employers make coverage changes.
IMS says it is still too early to discern the health care law’s ultimate impact on birth control.
At least for now, it doesn’t seem like more women are going on birth control because it’s free....
There’s also not much evidence of a shift to costlier long-acting contraceptives, such as hormonal implants. More reliable than the pill, they are gaining popularity in other economically advanced countries....
Birth control use is virtually universal in the United States, but about half of all pregnancies are still unplanned.
Passion takes over.
Forgetting to take the pill is a major reason.
Look at the divisive propaganda pre$$ blame the women for it!
As recently as the 1990s, many health insurance plans didn’t cover birth control. Protests, court cases, and new state laws changed that. Obama’s law is taking it another step.
Many medical groups see a strong rationale for free birth control. Contraception can help make a woman’s next pregnancy healthier by spacing births far enough apart, generally 18 months to two years.
Closely spaced births carry a risk of such problems as prematurity, low birth weight, even autism.
Look at them blaming that for all those ills brought upon my corporate controlled agriculture and medicine.
And even modest copays for medical care can discourage its use.
Uh-huh. Whatever excuse works here.
Related: Obama's Chump Change For Kids
But he wants $4 billion for illegal immigrant kids loaded with diseases so he can establish a North American Union.
This man Obama is evil.
--more--"
Let the lawsuits begin (at least the lawyers will be well employed)!
"Birth-control cases await Supreme Court" Associated Press July 07, 2014
WASHINGTON — The next legal dispute over religion and the new federal health law that is expected to reach the Supreme Court involves the question of how far the government must go to accommodate nonprofit groups that oppose paying for contraception.
More than four dozen lawsuits have been filed by faith-affiliated charities, colleges, and hospitals that oppose some or all forms of contraception as immoral.
The justices on June 30 relieved businesses with religious objections of their obligation to pay for women’s contraceptives among a range of preventive services the new law calls for in health plans.
Religious-oriented nonprofit groups already could opt out of covering the contraceptives. But the organizations say the accommodation provided by the administration does not go far enough because, though they are not on the hook financially, they remain complicit in the provision of government-approved contraceptives to women covered by their plans.
The high court will be asked to take on the issue in its term that begins in October. A challenge from the University of Notre Dame probably will be the first case.
The Obama administration argues that the accommodation creates a generous moral and financial buffer between religious objectors and funding birth control. The nonprofit groups just have to state that paying for any or all of the 20 devices and methods approved by government regulators would violate their religious beliefs. To do so, they must fill out a government document that enables their insurers or third-party administrators to take on the responsibility of paying for the birth control.
--more--"
Related: "A federal judge has granted nearly 200 Catholic employers an injunction to temporarily prevent the US government from forcing them to provide insurance coverage for contraceptives."
"Free birth control represents major shift in health care" by Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar | Associated Press July 05, 2014
WASHINGTON — Most privately insured women are getting free birth control under President Obama’s health law, a major coverage shift that’s likely to continue.
This week the Supreme Court allowed some employers with religious scruples to opt out, but most companies appear to be going in the opposite direction.
Then why all the furor?
**************
The average annual saving for women was $269. ‘‘It’s a big number,’’ said IMS Institute director Michael Kleinrock. The institute is the research arm of IMS Health, a Connecticut-based technology company that uses pharmacy records to track prescription drug sales.
Nothing like bank bonuses, but you know.
I can't believe they are arguing so vociferously over about $5 a week.
The core of Obama’s law — taxpayer-subsidized coverage for the uninsured — benefits a relatively small share of Americans.
That's what the core was?
But free preventive care — from flu shots to colonoscopies — is a dividend of sorts for the majority with employer coverage.
Expanded preventive coverage hasn’t gotten as much attention as another bonus for the already insured: the provision that allows young adults to remain on their parents’ policy until they turn 26. That may start to change with all the discussion of birth control.
Also not getting much attention:
Reports find deficiencies in health care law enrollments
Was a one-day wonder.
Business groups and employee benefits consultants say they see little chance that employers will roll back contraceptive coverage as a result of the Supreme Court ruling. The court carved out a space for ‘‘closely held’’ companies whose owners object on religious grounds. Most companies don’t fit that niche.
Meaning all this is a ginned-up issue generated for distraction.
‘‘I don’t think you will see a broad impact,’’ said Neil Trautwein, the top employee benefits expert for the National Retail Federation. ‘‘It’s a commonly offered benefit for many employers, including retailers.’’
The court decision involved ‘‘a very unique set of facts,’’ Trautwein added. ‘‘Intense religious beliefs, closely held companies, and the vehement objection to contraceptive coverage.’’
Before the Supreme Court ruling, some ‘‘grandfathered’’ plans unchanged since the health care law passed were already exempt from covering prevention at no cost, but that number is expected to shrink over time as employers make coverage changes.
IMS says it is still too early to discern the health care law’s ultimate impact on birth control.
At least for now, it doesn’t seem like more women are going on birth control because it’s free....
There’s also not much evidence of a shift to costlier long-acting contraceptives, such as hormonal implants. More reliable than the pill, they are gaining popularity in other economically advanced countries....
Birth control use is virtually universal in the United States, but about half of all pregnancies are still unplanned.
Passion takes over.
Forgetting to take the pill is a major reason.
Look at the divisive propaganda pre$$ blame the women for it!
As recently as the 1990s, many health insurance plans didn’t cover birth control. Protests, court cases, and new state laws changed that. Obama’s law is taking it another step.
Many medical groups see a strong rationale for free birth control. Contraception can help make a woman’s next pregnancy healthier by spacing births far enough apart, generally 18 months to two years.
Closely spaced births carry a risk of such problems as prematurity, low birth weight, even autism.
Look at them blaming that for all those ills brought upon my corporate controlled agriculture and medicine.
And even modest copays for medical care can discourage its use.
Uh-huh. Whatever excuse works here.
Related: Obama's Chump Change For Kids
But he wants $4 billion for illegal immigrant kids loaded with diseases so he can establish a North American Union.
This man Obama is evil.
--more--"
Let the lawsuits begin (at least the lawyers will be well employed)!
"Birth-control cases await Supreme Court" Associated Press July 07, 2014
WASHINGTON — The next legal dispute over religion and the new federal health law that is expected to reach the Supreme Court involves the question of how far the government must go to accommodate nonprofit groups that oppose paying for contraception.
More than four dozen lawsuits have been filed by faith-affiliated charities, colleges, and hospitals that oppose some or all forms of contraception as immoral.
The justices on June 30 relieved businesses with religious objections of their obligation to pay for women’s contraceptives among a range of preventive services the new law calls for in health plans.
Religious-oriented nonprofit groups already could opt out of covering the contraceptives. But the organizations say the accommodation provided by the administration does not go far enough because, though they are not on the hook financially, they remain complicit in the provision of government-approved contraceptives to women covered by their plans.
The high court will be asked to take on the issue in its term that begins in October. A challenge from the University of Notre Dame probably will be the first case.
The Obama administration argues that the accommodation creates a generous moral and financial buffer between religious objectors and funding birth control. The nonprofit groups just have to state that paying for any or all of the 20 devices and methods approved by government regulators would violate their religious beliefs. To do so, they must fill out a government document that enables their insurers or third-party administrators to take on the responsibility of paying for the birth control.
--more--"
Related: "A federal judge has granted nearly 200 Catholic employers an injunction to temporarily prevent the US government from forcing them to provide insurance coverage for contraceptives."
Supreme Court loses its way in Hobby Lobby decision
Globe gets agreement on the subterfuge.
Related: U.S. Surrogacy Surge
Quite a contradiction to birth control, 'eh?
"After Hobby Lobby, time to face the real war on religion" by John L. Allen Jr. | Globe Staff July 06, 2014
Last week’s big religion story in the States was Monday’s Supreme Court decision in the Hobby Lobby case, striking down the Affordable Care Act’s contraception mandates for some closely held firms. Predictably, America’s Catholic bishops applauded the ruling while expressing hope it will extend to nonprofits, such as the University of Notre Dame and the Little Sisters of the Poor, which also have legal challenges pending.
Wherever one stands on the merits of requiring employers to cover birth control, this seems a good time for the White House to find a political solution without putting everyone through litigation that now seems terribly redundant.
Among many faith-based groups, Monday’s ruling is being celebrated as a big win for religious freedom. And protecting religious expression was indeed a major focus of the decision. Yet Americans might do well to recall that in many other parts of the world, believers face threats far graver than lawsuits or fines.
Here’s a partial rundown of what was happening elsewhere while Americans were obsessing over which way the Supreme Court would go.
In Iraq, there was no Mass in Mosul on Sunday, June 15, the first time in almost 1,600 years the city was completely devoid of any Catholic worship on what Christians regard as the Lord’s Day. Observers say the 3,000 Christians who had remained in the city in mid-June, already down from an estimated 35,000 at the time of the US-led invasion in 2003, fled after Mosul fell to the militant Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.
See: Iraq
It's up to date.
In North Korea, a US citizen named Jeffrey Fowle was arrested for “perpetrating hostile acts,” after an inspection of his hotel room turned up a Bible. Officials say they’ll put him on trial, and it’s no idle threat. Since the armistice in 1953 that ratified division of the Korean peninsula, some 300,000 Christians in North Korea have disappeared and are presumed dead, while 50,000 to 70,000 are believed to be languishing in detention camps.
Related: CIA Fowles Up North Korean Assassination Attempt
In Nigeria, scores of church-goers were killed in the latest wave of violence by the radical Boko Haram movement, with militants firing on four churches in Borno state, including the Protestant Church of Christ in Nigeria and the Pentecostal Deeper Life Bible Church, and then setting them ablaze. The death toll reportedly was at least 30.
See: Nigeria
In China, more than 360 churches have been targeted for either demolition or defacement, such as the removal of crosses on the exterior. The official logic is clearing space for urban development projects. But it seems clear the crackdown is directed at churches that resist the control of government agencies whose mission is what authorities call “theological reconstruction,” meaning purging Christianity of elements which the state regards as incompatible with its methods and priorities.
That makes this a laugh.
In India, 35 villages in Chhattisgarh state announced a ban on non-Hindus entering the area, following an incident in which Christian families were beaten by Hindu radicals. Such violence is stunningly common. The Evangelical Fellowship of India recorded 131 such acts in 2012, an average of one every 2.7 days. Perpetrators are rarely arrested or charged, in part because India’s Christian population is disproportionately composed of tribal minorities and the underclass of the old caste system.
And now with the new guy Modi in office....
In a nutshell, this is what a real “war on religion” looks like....
--more--"
The war on labor:
"The Supreme Court dealt a limited blow to labor unions Monday by ruling that some government employees did not have to pay any fees to the labor organizations representing them. But the court declined to strike down a decades-old precedent that required many public-sector workers to pay union fees. In other business-related cases before the justices, the court Monday: Said it will consider.... Declined to hear.... Decided not to.... A former BP executive can be tried on a charge that he obstructed a congressional investigation into the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill, a federal Appeals Court in New Orleans said in a ruling posted on Monday."
Maybe the best choice is to be celibate and stop reading the Boston Globe.
Well, I'm going to abort posting for the rest of the day because I have a basketball game to get ready for. Sorry this blog doesn't produce anything good anymore, readers.
