Broader right to object to birth control - New SCOTUS injunction 6/3/14

[boston bean]

Expanding the rights of religious opponents of birth control, a divided Supreme Court on Thursday afternoon spared an Illinois college — and maybe hundreds of other non-profit institutions — from obeying government regulations that seek to assure access to pregnancy prevention services for female workers and students. In the same order, the majority essentially told the government to modify its own rules if it wants to keep those services available.

Three Justices wrote a sharply worded dissent, accusing the majority of creating on its own a “new administrative regime” that will seriously complicate the operation of the birth control mandate under the new federal health care law. The majority, the dissenters said, “has no reason to think that the administrative scheme it foists on the government today is workable or effective on a national scale.”

The ruling, which the majority insisted was temporary and had settled nothing finally about the legal issues at stake, came three days after the Court in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby had given for-profit businesses whose owners have religious objections to birth control a right to refuse to provide those services in their employee health plans.

The plea by Wheaton College, a religious institution in Illinois with about 3,000 students, moved the Court beyond for-profit firms to the world of non-profit religious colleges, hospitals, and other charities. The government had already moved to accommodate their beliefs, but that had not gone far enough for the college and for scores of other non-profits. With the Court’s new order, they gained additional separation from the birth-control mandate.

http://www.scotusblog.com/2014/07/broader-right-to-object-to-birth-control/

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, Justice Sotomayor wrote, was at odds with the 5-to-4 decision on 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,” Justice Sotomayor wrote. “Not so today.”

The court’s action, she added, even “undermines confidence in this institution.”

Monday’s decision and the order on Thursday were dual blows to the Obama administration’s efforts to provide contraception coverage, said Walter Dellinger, who was acting United States solicitor general in the Clinton administration.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/04/us/politics/supreme-court-order-suspends-contraception-rule-for-christian-college.html

So, now these entities who object to birth control do not have to notify the insurance companies of their exception. They just don't have to offer it. Wheatons argument that notifying insurance companies of the exception was against their religious beliefs because in doing so they were in a way providing access to birth control, and that reasoning was enough for the court to provide the injunction.

The courts ruling on Monday where they affirmed that the redress of their decision in Hobby Lobby was for the gov't to provide this access, is no longer operable. The gov't is not set up to handle these exceptions in this way and in effect has driven a stake through the BC access portion of ACA.

[davidpdx]

1. The money quote

The government had already moved to accommodate their beliefs, but that had not gone far enough for the college and for scores of other non-profits. With the Court’s new order, they gained additional separation from the birth-control mandate.

It will NEVER be enough.

[gratuitous]

2. No, nothing will ever be enough for men such as these

They're also the folks who think that filling out a form is too onerous a burden for a college. But it doesn't burden a woman to travel 300 miles for a doctor's appointment, followed by a three day waiting period before getting a prescription or receiving treatment.

So, female voters and non-female voters who might know and care about females, what is your reaction going to be come November when the politicians who put these latter-day inquisitionists in power ask for your vote?