WASHINGTON — Eleven legislators have filed an amicus brief stating that the federal contraception mandate violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), signed into law in 1993 by President Bill Clinton.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, a leading sponsor of RFRA, was among the group of lawmakers who filed the brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, which will rule on a legal challenge to the Health and Human Services' mandate brought by Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., a Christian-owned retail chain.
“As one of the lead sponsors of RFRA, it’s deeply troubling to see this White House trample on the religious freedom the law seeks to protect,” Hatch said in a statement marking the politicians’ decision to file the brief.
Religious plaintiffs — both for-profit and nonprofit employers — have filed more than 40 legal challenges charging that the HHS mandate violates both RFRA and their constitutional right to free exercise. However, legal experts say that RFRA provides a stronger standard for securing religious liberty.
“RFRA protects ‘any exercise of religion’ for every American, but the abortion-pill mandate picks and chooses who will receive religious freedom and then gives exemptions only to churches,” said Matt Bowman, senior legal counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom, which is representing a number of plaintiffs in HHS cases.
The law2makers’ action comes as the U.S. bishops and their allies in Congress are pressing harder to include conscience protections related to the HHS mandate in up-coming federal appropriations legislation.
In a Feb. 15 letter to Congress, Archbishop William Lori, chairman of the bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee for Religious Liberty, advocated for specific conscience provisions and urged that they be incorporated “in the upcoming legislative proposals to fund the federal government.”
Archbishop Lori asked that Congress include language that extends “the long-standing federal policy on conscience to the new coverage mandates for private health plans created by the Affordable Care Act, so Americans are not forced to violate their fundamental moral and religious convictions in order to offer, sponsor and purchase health coverage.”
Further, he called on lawmakers to include language that “clarifies current nondiscrimination laws to improve protection of individuals and institutions that decline involvement in abortion, allowing the victims of discrimination to vindicate their rights in court.”
Last year, after HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius approved the contraception mandate on Jan. 20, 2012, the U.S. bishops began to actively explore a legislative strategy to both expand the law’s narrow religious exemption and shield other private employers that opposed the mandate on moral grounds. But the proposed legislation failed to garner sufficient support on Capitol Hill, resulting in an explosion of legal challenges filed by for-profit and nonprofit plaintiffs.
On Feb. 1, 2013, the Obama administration unveiled the details of its modified accommodation for church-affiliated institutions that were not covered under the religious exemption. For-profit companies were again denied any conscience protections.
The U.S. bishops soon concluded that the administration’s latest proposal was still inadequate, and they expressed dismay that it offered no reprieve for employers like Hobby Lobby.
In his letter, Archbishop Lori acknowledged that the Feb. 1 proposal offered more details about the “accommodation,” but it still fell short.
The modified proposal said that accommodated church employers will play no role in the provision of services. Employee information will automatically be transmitted to an insurance carrier or a designated third party that will provide the services without charge.
The White House said the plan effectively resolved the objections of church leaders, but Archbishop Lori noted that the employees themselves could not opt out, even if they wanted to.
“If a religious organization is not exempt, its insurance company or third-party administrator will impose the full mandate ‘automatically’ on the organization’s employees and their female children, using the personal information that the employer had entrusted to them solely to provide a plan consistent with the organization’s faith,” read the archbishop’s letter.
“This part of the mandate, if adopted as a final rule, is expected to take effect by Aug. 1 of this year.”
He confirmed that Church leaders would continue to advocate for broad conscience protections as they engage “the administration and all branches and levels of government.”
On Feb. 13, Sister Carol Keehan, the president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association, an industry lobby, issued a statement that said the White House’s Feb. 1 proposal achieved “substantial progress” in the ongoing negotiations between HHS and her organization.
Sister Carol noted that CHA members “have been asked by HHS to evaluate three possible options for using a third-party administrator (TPA) and make recommendations. CHA has asked our members to review these options in relation to their self-insurance structures and give us input. CHA will provide that to HHS during the comment period.”
Archbishop Lori’s statement was part of a coordinated legislative effort to mobilize U.S. Catholics and others who oppose the mandate. An “action alert” email campaign began in mid-February, calling on citizens to “urge your representative and two senators” to “support legislation to protect the rights of conscience in health care when you take up … 'must-pass' bills to fund the federal government.”
The 11 legislators who signed the brief filed with the 10th Circuit all voted for the RFRA when it passed Congress in 1993, garnering a 97-3 vote in the Senate and unanimous support in the House.
In their brief, the lawmakers write that the administration “ignored RFRA in formulating the narrow religious exemption at the outset and have only begun to attend to its requirements because of litigation and the reaction to public scrutiny.”
The brief added: “Defendants’ refusal to address RFRA in any meaningful way (except when sued in federal court) is remarkable. But it is also consistent with the way defendants have treated the law of religious freedom from the beginning of the HHS mandate.”
In addition to Hatch, the brief was signed by Sens. Dan Coats, R-Ind., Thad Cochran, R-Miss., Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Pat Roberts, R-Kan., and Richard Shelby, R-Ala., and Reps. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, and Frank Wolf, R-Va.
Joan Frawley Desmond is the Register’s senior editor.
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Not a Democrat in the bunch. That says a lot. God Help America.
Thanks for listing the names of those who have signed this amicus. I will call my Texas lawmaker and thank him!
For only fourteen out of five hundred and thirty-five to have signed on to this amicus brief is pretty sad, but then it would be a bridge too far to expect any Democrat to choose loyalty to the law over loyalty to party.
It amazes me that my local Bishop and priests have nothing to say about any of this crisis our church and country are in. They act like nothing is going on.
More telling are the facts that only 11 Members of the Congress (2%) out of 535 cosigned the Amicus brief, yet 36 % of the Members are lawyers. Therefore, it appears to us that 98% of Members of Congress are the problem, irrespective of their party affiliation. May God have mercy on us all!
The HHS Mandate is much, much more sinister than the Bishop’s examination reveals. The underlying fact is that those behind the Mandate will be given a leg-up on lawfully promoting male sexual perversion and sexual exploitation of women - to an extent that only a horror story can depict. “Employee information will automatically be transmitted to an insurance carrier or a designated third party”, this article says. HHS would employ government officials, insurance agents and administrative assistants, lawyers, and other government agency employees and allow them access to a woman’s private records of her sexual habits - with no limits as to what can be done with them.
Consider a likely scenario. Imagine you are parents of a teenaged girl, and a male acquaintance of hers was a rapist of underaged women who sexually assaulted her. Let us compare portions of her case to one for a person who objects to HHS mandating that they provide abortion and contraceptives to their employees.
Let the daughter accuse said rapist of inappropriate/illegal advances toward her. A government inquiry could be made by the rapist under the HHS Mandate should the he plea innocent. He (HHS) would have free, easily obtainable (and exclusive) access to the girl’s (employee’s) private medical documents without needing consent from the parents (employer). He would have contact with her facilitated so that he can “inquire” whether she would be legally open to sexual contact with him (before and/or after the act) because of her affinity for “preventative measures that avoid pregnancy risk”. He would also know what products she is in the market for. Such information is, of course, a legal document that can be used to support his case, should she decide to press rape charges. And what jury “of her peers” would not judge her to be at fault (read: deserves to be raped) if she were taking the pill or has a practice of using preventative abortifacients? The outcome always favors the criminal if the jury sees the woman as a !@#$%.
Although exposure of a woman’s use of these anti-life methods may harm her reputation more than it would for a woman who refuses them, the existence of such information for perusal is unnerving. We all know how “secure” those documents would be. Anybody looking for a virgin? A loose woman? Someone who says she’s pro-life but is taking the pill? A mother of five who had an abortion? Don’t let them fool you. There are plenty of hot political topics Obama’s anti-Catholic HHS documents can and will be used for, as intended. Just supporting a rapist’s, child abuser’s, or pimp’s case against women isn’t enough. Public scandals against the Church because of a “Catholic” woman’s “reproductive health” practices is fodder for the media any day.
At the expense of purity, preventing/terminating pregnancy enables irresponsible, sinful behavior while under the cloak of an act of charity, just like the alcohol industry’s “designated driver” campaign does for drunks. In the end, women who “play around” sexually are fair game for all the perverts and rapists interested in her. And women who do not play around are considered to be of little or no use politically - the religious ones are fair game for name-callers and accusations of bigotry. This is the ultimate woman-hater’s law - a real no-win situation for all women.
Holy Mary, Mother of God, help us, we pray!
The HHS Mandate is much, much more sinister than the Bishop’s examination reveals. The underlying fact is that those behind the Mandate will be given a leg-up on lawfully promoting male sexual perversion and sexual exploitation of women - to an extent that only a horror story can depict. “Employee information will automatically be transmitted to an insurance carrier or a designated third party”, this article says. HHS would employ government officials, insurance agents and administrative assistants, lawyers, and other government agency employees and allow them access to a woman’s private records of her sexual habits - with no limits as to what can be done with them.
Consider a likely scenario. Imagine you are parents of a teenaged girl, and a male acquaintance of hers was a rapist of underaged women who sexually assaulted her. Let us compare portions of her case to one for a person who objects to HHS mandating that they provide abortion and contraceptives to their employees.
Let the daughter accuse said rapist of inappropriate/illegal advances toward her. A government inquiry could be made by the rapist under the HHS Mandate should the he plea innocent. He (HHS) would have free, easily obtainable (and exclusive) access to the girl’s (employee’s) private medical documents without needing consent from the parents (employer). He would have contact with her facilitated so that he can “inquire” whether she would be legally open to sexual contact with him (before and/or after the act) because of her affinity for “preventative measures that avoid pregnancy risk”. He would also know what products she is in the market for. Such information is, of course, a legal document that can be used to support his case, should she decide to press rape charges. And what jury “of her peers” would not judge her to be at fault (read: deserves to be raped) if she were taking the pill or has a practice of using preventative abortifacients? The outcome always favors the criminal if the jury sees the woman as a !@#$%.
Although exposure of a woman’s use of these anti-life methods may harm her reputation more than it would for a woman who refuses them, the existence of such information for perusal is unnerving. We all know how “secure” those documents would be. Anybody looking for a virgin? A loose woman? Someone who says she’s pro-life but is taking the pill? A mother of five who had an abortion? Don’t let them fool you. There are plenty of hot political topics Obama’s anti-Catholic HHS documents can and will be used for, as intended. Just supporting a rapist’s, child abuser’s, or pimp’s case against women isn’t enough. Public scandals against the Church because of a “Catholic” woman’s “reproductive health” practices is fodder for the media any day.
At the expense of purity, preventing/terminating pregnancy enables irresponsible, sinful behavior while under the cloak of an act of charity, just like the alcohol industry’s “designated driver” campaign does for drunks. In the end, women who “play around” sexually are fair game for all the perverts and rapists interested in her. And women who do not play around are considered to be of little or no use politically - the religious ones are fair game for name-callers and accusations of bigotry. This is the ultimate woman-hater’s law - a real no-win situation for all women.
Holy Mary, Mother of God, help us!
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