The Supreme Court on Monday refused to hear a challenge to ObamaCare brought by a Virginia-based Christian university, ending for now one of the biggest remaining legal fights against the health care law.
The justices, in turning away the lawsuit from Liberty University and leaving in place a federal appeals court ruling dismissing it, did not comment on their decision. The decision comes less than a week after the high court agreed to hear a separate challenge from Hobby Lobby and one other company to the law's so-called contraception mandate -- the requirement on most employers to provide access to contraceptive coverage.
But Liberty University's case was more expansive. The university had mounted a major challenge to the law, going after the contraception mandate but also the requirement on employers to provide coverage.
Liberty made several arguments in challenging the portion of the health care law that requires most employers to provide health insurance to their workers or pay a fine. The 4th U.S. Circuit of Appeals in Richmond, Va., rejected those claims.
With the high court's decision, that ruling remains in place.
The Supreme Court's decision comes more than a year after it had ordered the federal appeals court to reconsider Liberty University's claims that the law violates the school's religious freedoms.
The courts are continuing to wade through numerous challenges to the Affordable Care Act, despite the major ruling in June 2012 that upheld the bulk of the law by ruling the individual mandate -- the requirement on individuals to buy health insurance -- valid.
But the issue of the contraception mandate will come before the Supreme Court, perhaps as early as March. The court last week said it would hear the challenge from Hobby Lobby and Pennsylvania company Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp.
The court is set to weigh in on the dispute over whether businesses can use religious objections to avoid a requirement in the law to cover birth control for employees.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Three Obamacare cases are now before the Court, however. Among them, it’s the abortifacents that are the sticking point for the owners of Hobby Lobby, David and Barbara Green and their family. I’ve known them for years as I represented Oklahoma City in Congress. Media accounts are on-target when they describe how the Greens run Hobby Lobby on Christian principles and how they built it from a tiny operation to a major national chain. Their stores all close on Sundays. They run faith-promoting religious ads on Easter and other occasions. They immerse themselves in community efforts but shy away from political activity. They pay workers well and provide health coverage that includes birth control, including 16 of 20 FDA-approved and Obamacare-required contraceptives. But the Greens draw the line at four particular contraceptives (two drugs and two devices) that they sincerely conclude induce abortion rather than preventing pregnancy.
ReplyDeleteFor refusing to have a role in what they conclude is an abortion, they face fines of $100 per employee per day. For 13,000 workers, that is $1.3-million daily, $475-million per year. That is how severely the backers of Obamacare desire to punish anyone who opposes the sexual-social agenda behind their contraception mandate.
A better and remarkably clear illustration of the agenda comes from the recent Obamacare ad campaign in Colorado, part of $21-million in taxpayer money spent trying to get 20-somethings to enroll. Sex and alcohol themes dominate the series of ads. In one, a young woman holds birth control pills, eyeballs a smirking guy and exclaims, “OMG, he’s hot! Let’s hope he’s as easy to get as this birth control. My health insurance covers the pill, which means all I have to worry about is getting him between the covers.” Below is the logo, “Thanks, Obamacare!”
Widely denounced for depicting young women as sluts, these ads reveal an agenda that’s always been behind the contraceptive mandate: to enable total sexual freedom, without commitment and without consequence.
When birth control became inexpensive and widely available it created conditions for America’s cultural upheaval. Women can have sex without the consequence of pregnancy and men can take advantage. But other consequences don’t cease, including diseases of the body, mind and spirit.
Despite phony pretense from the Left, there is no issue over availability of birth control. It’s widely available and immensely affordable. Nobody is taking it away and nobody is even talking about taking it away. Widespread availability and affordability is a permanent circumstance in America, even without Obamacare.
So why should Obama and other advocates impose a $475-million fine on Hobby Lobby when birth control pills can be bought for $9 a month? The only answer seems to be that the President and this alliance have zero tolerance for those who disagree with them, especially those who disagree with them publicly. They must compel us to join them and to demonstrate our obedience. Sorry, Mr. President, but I’m opposed to The Borg and we don’t need to be assimilated.
http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/ernest-istook-knowing-inside/2013/dec/2/free-sex-was-core-obamacare-issue-now-hobby-lobby-/
It's all about consistency. That's why we disagree with the waivers and other things that have come up and yes I too your liberal progressive friend feel that Obama did his own law a great dis-service by granting any waivers for anything.
ReplyDeleteNow about birth control. Yes some business owners are against it on religious grounds and that is understood. But for the affordable health care act to work all people must have all access to equal services. To say some people cannot have that included in their plan and others do regardless of if it is employer provided or exchange purchased. It's about getting every body on equal footing. If the employer apposes birth control they don't have to use it. I really don't see the issue for providing it through a health insurance plan for someone else it is just more obstructionism. Birth control pills can cost as little as $9 a month. But they can also be upwards of $40-$50 dollars a month. One pill does not fit all. To people working at a place like Hobby Lobby, hopefully making at least 10 dollars an hour (I say that because this is supposed to be one of those employers who care greatly about their employees), $40 or $50 dollars is a lot of money. So do we go through and find out which pill each employee needs? That would be a violation of health privacy laws I would think.
" or prohibiting the free exercise thereof"....
ReplyDeleteDamn... yet another one of those inconvenient and might I add antiquated provisions of an out of date relic of an ancient civilization... THAT HAS YET TO BE REPEALED OR AMENDED!