“Supreme Court Rejects Contraceptives Mandate for Some Corporations“:
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled on Monday that requiring family-owned corporations to pay for insurance coverage for contraception under the Affordable Care Act violated a federal law protecting religious freedom. It was, the dissent said, “a decision of startling breadth.”
The 5-to-4 ruling, which applied to two companies owned by Christian families, opened the door to challenges from other corporations over laws that they claim violate their religious liberty.
Why would this come as a surprise to anyone? It’s seems obvious that if a corporation or organization has Freedom of Speech (Citizens United ruling), they also have Freedom of Religion. Too bad the court can’t see that applies to actual citizens…
Here are some selected lines from Justice Ginsberg’s dissent as well as a link to the completer minority opinion.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/06/best-lines-hobby-lobby-decision
As one political analyst stated on MSNBC yesterday, the SCOTUS decision may have no effect. Cited was the fact that religious institutions such as Catholic hospitals, schools, etc who have a moral objection to these health care items are already granted an exemption from paying for contraceptives for employees under ACA&PP by having the insurance companies absorbing the cost.
More at: http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/6/30/hobby-lobby-supremecourtdecision.html
I still think the HOBBY LOBBY ruling was a stupid one allowing for-profit commercial companies and their “holier than thou” owners an exemption. It opens the flood gates for all sort of legal objections based upon the religion of owners.
I think you hit on the ultimate goal here, Duane. This is a back-door way for companies to get rid of certain insurances mandates that they don’t want to pay for. It’s definitely going to make my wife have to get contraception outside of her work insurance.
The real offensive part about the Hobby Lobby decision is that the 5 men on the Court have clearly prioritized corporations over the individual rights of women. And this is far from the only decision where they have that mentality.
I believe the Robert’s court, or I should say the Robert’s majority, will have a place in SCOTUS history as one whose ideology and prejudice clearly and unjustly took precedence over the law on three major decisions affecting women’s health, voting rights, and workers.
Their decision making regarding these issues call to mind descriptive terms such as misogynistic, racist, and union busting by some of us. What could we expect from the legacy of the Bush/Cheney era!
I enjoyed an analysis by Ian Millmiser in “The Most Partisan Supreme Court Justice of All.” In the article, The depth of Alito’s partisanship was described by one Law Professor as “‘ “Scalia is a Roosevelt Liberal in comparison’ to Alito.” YIKES!
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/07/02/3455366/the-most-partisan-justice/?elq=~~eloqua..type–emailfield..syntax–recipientid~~&elqCampaignId=~~eloqua..type–campaign..campaignid–0..fieldname–id~~
As you know, Alito delivered the majority opinion.