Burwell V. Hobby Lobby Case Study

The contraceptive coverage in the new Health Care law makes preventative care more accessible and affordable to millions of Americans. This is particularly important for women who are more likely to avoid the cost of contraceptives because of cost. To help address these barriers in terms of cost and ensure that all women have access to preventative Health Care Act, all new private insurance plan that covers a wide range of preventative services such as breast x-rays, pap smears smoking prevention and contraception without co-payments or requirements for sharing other costs. The current problem is that the Affordable Care Act is imposing on the 500 store chains of Hobby Lobby’s religious rights by forcing the company to provide full coverage of contraceptives of the 13,000 workers as part of its health care plans. David Green and family, whom founded Hobby Lobby, believe that the healthcare act is violating their held religious convictions.

In September 2012, Hobby Lobby filed suit against the U.S. government to exempt itself from the contraceptive mandate of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). Hobby Lobby’s owners are evangelical Christians who believe that the contraceptive mandate violates their religious beliefs; specifically, that life begins at conception when successful fertilization occurs within a prospective mother. Providing contraceptive measures, in Hobby Lobby’s view, would facilitate the abortion of a pregnancy, which most evangelicals equate to murder. On June 30, 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Hobby Lobby, along with all other closely held for-profit

Galloway (2013), Galloway argued that the town of Greece violated the establishment clause. The establishment clause within the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution states that the national government is unable to establish an official religion. In this court case, it was ruled that the prayers at the town hall did not violate the establishment clause. The basis for this ruling had to do with tradition. In the case of Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores (2013), the Green family had to provide health care to their employees under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA). The ruling for this case was that the religious beliefs of the Green family are a factor that can let them deny health care to employees that have different religious beliefs. With a five to four ruling, the Hobby Lobby Stores won the case. These two cases show how Freedom of Religion can be used

In the supreme court case United States v. Lee the ruling stated that a company’s or employer’s personal religious beliefs do not allow a company an exemption from business health

Often times in today’s world we take certain luxuries for granted. The right to vote, the right of free speech, etc. But one of those luxuries that people often don’t consider is the right for women to use birth control. The Supreme Court case that argued for the use of contraceptives was Griswold vs Connecticut. The court case was argued March 29th-30th 1965, but was not decided until June 7th 1965. The case was on the debate of whether or not the use of contraceptives should be legalized. Griswold, the Executive and Medical Director of Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut, was on the side arguing for the legalization of the use of contraceptives in a marriage. While the opposing side, the state of Connecticut statute, had forbidden the use of contraceptives since 1879.

There were 12 lawsuits from Catholic organizations against the department of health and human services in 2012 and there were all about amendments present in the current healthcare laws given by Obamacare. “The 5-4 decision allowed closely-held companies to opt out of offering contraceptives on the basis of religious beliefs. The case hinged on the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) passed by Congress in 1993” (Obamacare Lawsuits). The National Federation of Independent Business V. Sebelius, and Halbig V. Sebelius were held in position to advanced premium tax credits and the individual health insurance mandate. The official supreme court ruling was that ”the court upheld the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate as a legitimate exercise of Congress' Article I power to lay and collect taxes” (Obamacare Lawsuits). The court upheld its legitimacy because of the power given by the constitution under the commerce clause.

I strongly agreed with the Supreme Court’s decision to exempt Hobby Lobby, and businesses like it, from the ACA mandates for covering certain forms of contraception. The contraceptives that are in dispute are argued to contribute to abortions, or termination of the pregnancy, after the fact. Due to these medications, and devices contributing to the termination of a pregnancy, it is vital that they be exempted. The termination of a pregnancy is a very divisive issue in America. Many hold that a life is being extinguished when the pregnancy is terminated. For this reason, it would be a violation of the Free Exercise Clause which violates such a closely held religious position about life. It does not, however, outlaw such products. People are free to exercise their rights, and obtain the medications, or devises elsewhere.

The First Amendment of the United States Constitution grants United States Citizens the right to freedom of religion (Horwitz 1). According to Supreme Court interpretation, the primary purpose of this amendment is to prevent government interference with the practice of religion. Since the 1950's this amendment has been slowly worn away, resulting in the government limiting its citizens' rights to freely pray, worship, and even proselytize. While various laws are often struck down in the Supreme Court, this process takes time and damage is done to freedom while awaiting the decision.

Opponents of the mandate also refer to the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 when challenging the ACA’s contraceptive requirements. Based on the Kaiser Family Foundation’s legal analysis of the RFRA, in regards to religiously affiliated nonprofit organizations, employers would qualify from an exemption should the government not have a compelling interest to provide preventative care (including contraceptives) or accommodation meet the compelling interest in the least restrictive way. The general public is very divided on this issue; pew research on the birth control insurance mandate found that from a survey of 1,501 adults: 48% believe religiously affiliated institutions should be exempt from this rule, 44 believe religiously affiliated organizations should be required to cover for contraceptives, and 8% are unsure/don’t know. Of the Catholic group, the percentages were 55%, 39%, and 7%, respectively. There is indeed a wide variety of opinions in this subject: Some saying that all religiously-affiliated organizations should abide to the contraception mandate, others saying certain ones, while others saying none. The main issue is where to set that line of the exemption. There have been efforts by religiously affiliated organizations (most of which are affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church) to extent exemptions to religiously affiliated organizations. Some of the more high profile cases regarding this issue include the Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. (2014) and the Zubik v. Burwell (2016); both resulting in split decisions (5-4 and 4-4, respectively). Several smaller cases were made pertaining to this issue, many of these cases including Sylvia Mary Mathews Burwel, the 22nd United States Secretary of

… HHS and the dissent nonetheless argue that RFRA does not cover Conestoga, Hobby Lobby and Mardel because they cannot ‘exercise … religion.’ … [What is] also flawed is the claim that [the] RFRA offers no protection because it only codified pre-Smith Free Exercise Clause precedents…

Whether big or small, corporations should not be treated like people, let alone granted religious freedom. The Supreme Court continued the horrible trend of pro-corporation rights. Whether one stands with Hobby Lobby, Inc. and considers this case a success of religious freedom or an intrusion, I see it as the court favored corporation’s rights over personal rights. Female workers should be given the availability to use contraceptives. In 2012, the Supreme Court ruled on the case of Burwell v. Hobby. The case dealt with the free exercise clause under the first amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFTA) and whether a for-profit corporation could be exempt from the Affordable Care Act. The free exercise clause of the First Amendment states that Congress shall make no law...prohibiting the free exercise of religion. Therefore, Religious Freedom Restoration Act prohibits the government from “substantially burdening” a person’s exercise of religion unless “application of the burden is in furtherance of a compelling government interest” and is the “least restrictive means of furthering that interest”.

Health Care in the United States is undergoing a controversial transition at the hand of Obama’s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. One goal of the PPACA is to make preventative care more accessible and affordable to millions of Americans (National Women’s Law Center, 2011). “Among the many firsts: employers that offer health insurance must cover certain preventative measures for women, including contraception” (Corbin 2013, p. 1470). This requirement has been coined the “contraception mandate” and has generated an uproar among many Catholic employers in the US (Corbin 2013, p. 1470); they believe it is in violation of their basic rights of religious freedom and freedom of speech to be forced to provide contraceptive services to

One of the most major rights being religious freedom among corporations. For example, in the case of Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, the discussion of “religious freedoms” among corporations was brought up regarding the “contraceptive mandate” issued to employees under the Affordable Care Act. Although this was a 5-4 case in which the corporation was victorious, it is aiding in setting a precedent for religious corporations to “unjustly force their beliefs” on their employees (Millhiser). As a result, workers of any religious beliefs who desire contraceptives are limited by Hobby Lobby, a product that is granted by law. Not only is this interfering with the the Affordable Care Act, but it is also empowering corporations to influence the rights held by their workers. On the other hand, others may not regard this as a significant issue for the Supreme Court’s application of religious exemption applies only to “closely held private corporations”. However, this is not the case as “More than 90 percent of all US firms are close corporations” (Nagar 1). This means that a decision such as the one adjudicated for Hobby Lobby can apply to nearly all American

They should not have to worry about Congress interfering or dictating what those beliefs should be. The Religious Freedom Restoration Act was created for this very reason. The goal of this act was to protect against government actions that would target or burden religious activities or practices (Rivkin and Wheland). It is clear that forcing businesses to cover something that they do not believe in would burden their consciences and possibly cause businesses to close or not open in order to comply with their religious principles.

Today, we are seeing more companies exercise their right to control what medications they allow on their corporate health insurance plans. In this case, Hobby Lobby has exercised its right to not pay or contribute to employees needing or wanting birth control. According to Hobby Lobby, birth control is in strict contrast with their religious beliefs (Planned Parenthood ). “On June 30, 2014, the US Supreme Court allowed certain bosses to block employees’ access to birth control. The decision applied to more than half of the US workforce.” (Planned Parenthood ). While Hobby Lobby is a large corporation with operations throughout the United