Cheer up, says my inner Pollyanna, this is not the worst. It's not nearly as bad as the Dread Scott decision, which declared certain human beings to be nothing more than chattel.
True, the still small voice of conscience replies, but you're setting the bar very low. Should we tolerate the bad simply because it's a lot less evil than something else?
My conscience is convinced that the 5-4 Supreme Court decision of June 30, 2014, which grants Hobby Lobby an exemption from providing certain forms of contraception sets a very bad precedent. It will now proceed to tell you why.
The conclusion of the Court had not as much to do with the First Amendment as it did with The Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, passed under the Clinton administration with nearly unanimous support from both Democrats and Republicans. It was passed specifically to prevent prosecution of groups of Native Americans which use the otherwise illicit drug, peyote, during religious rituals. It is important to note that all Supreme Court rulings set precedents that are frequently abused. Convicts sued, for instance, on the basis of this law, that their sincerely held religious beliefs demanded that they have a steak dinner once a week. A Quaker woman sued under this law to be exempt from income tax, since a good part of it is used for military purposes. Many frivolous lawsuits were challenged at taxpayers' expense. Thanks to Burwell vs Hobby Lobby, there will undoubtedly be more such cases.
My conscience will now provide four reasons why this decision is very bad. The list is not meant to be exhaustive.
1. Sincerely Held Religious Beliefs
The Court upheld that "closely held for profit corporations" are not required to provide contraception under the Affordable Care Act if doing so violates "sincerely held religious beliefs" (Justice Kennedy.) Do we really want the justices on the Supreme Court to decide which religious beliefs are sincere and which are not? I think not. As mentioned previously, rulings set precedents--there are surely to be challenges to extend "religious freedom" beyond family-owned businesses and to grant exceptions for more than contraception. What if a family-owned business of faith-healers decides not to cover antibiotics? The possibilities for abuse are legion!
2. Accommodation Can Go Too Far
America has a long and (mostly) admirable tradition of accommodating religious beliefs. I will give you a good example from my experience in pediatrics. I was once involved in testifying against a group called "Dissatisfied Parents Together (DPT)," which held the erroneous belief that vaccines were the cause of much misery while, in fact, they prevent it. I am a pediatrician and will let you in on a dirty--actually clean--little secret. Maryland, the state in which I practice, allowed exemptions from vaccines only for members of religions whose teachings specifically forbade vaccination. (At that time, there were only two.) Advocates for religious freedom considered the law to be too restrictive; it was overturned. Now, anyone who has a "bona fide religious conviction" that vaccines are wrong can get an exemption even if they don't belong to any specific denomination. Here's the secret: we don't tell our patients that. The schools exclude those whose shots are delinquent. We don't tell them about the easy exemption; if we did and it became popular, children would suffer terribly. When I trained in medicine in the early seventies, crippling and fatal cases of meningitis were commonplace. Thanks to vaccines, they are now extremely rare. If the "religious" exemption were frequently used, decency would demand that this loophole be closed.
We doctors, for the most part, are only against religious freedom when it interferes with the common good. Imposing the Hobby Lobby's parochial beliefs on others certainly doesn't foster the common good. Let me give you an example. A diabetic woman, unable to use regular contraceptives, is prescribed an I.U.D by her doctor. It is denied. She gets pregnant and dies from complications of diabetes. This could happen!
Should we expand accommodation for religious beliefs to include imposing those beliefs on others when they might cause great harm? I think not.
3. When Religious Beliefs are Rigid, Should Accommodation be Soft?
Contrary to what many think, the Hobby Lobby, run by a fundamentalist Christian family, does not oppose all forms of contraception. They are vehemently opposed to abortion. They believe that intrauterine devices and the morning after pill induce abortion. Science disagrees. Pregnancy begins when the fertilized egg become implanted in the womb, not before. The owners of Hobby Lobby assert, presumably--and correctly--that fertilization occurs before implantation. Yet fertilized eggs can exist in a Petri Dish as well as in the fallopian tubes--Pregnancy, therefore, begins with implantation.
The Hobby Lobby family claims that their refusal is a form of, in their words, Standing Up for Jesus Christ. This implies that virtually all scientists are Sitting Down Against Him. This is nonsense. Life is sometimes quite ambiguous, whether one likes it or not. Shouldn't the Hobby Lobby family be sufficiently humble--a religious virtue--to consider that they might be wrong when so many good people--including good, religious people--are convinced they are? Self-righteous rigidity--is this what true religion is about?
Again, should the law accommodate this rigidity when it can cause great harm? Again, I think not.
4. The Poor Are Hit the Hardest
If contraception--Catholic bishops think virtually forms of contraception are evil--are not covered, it is the poor who will suffer the most. The rich will always be able to obtain all forms of birth control. Contraception, of course, prevents unwanted pregnancies which otherwise might lead to abortion. The poor are having increasing difficulties obtaining abortions in certain states. The rich can always take a trip North! Is this fair?
All right, it's not the Dread Scott case. Yet it's right for conscience to stand up for the common good and to dread its outcome--What's wrong with that gang of five?
True, the still small voice of conscience replies, but you're setting the bar very low. Should we tolerate the bad simply because it's a lot less evil than something else?
My conscience is convinced that the 5-4 Supreme Court decision of June 30, 2014, which grants Hobby Lobby an exemption from providing certain forms of contraception sets a very bad precedent. It will now proceed to tell you why.
The conclusion of the Court had not as much to do with the First Amendment as it did with The Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, passed under the Clinton administration with nearly unanimous support from both Democrats and Republicans. It was passed specifically to prevent prosecution of groups of Native Americans which use the otherwise illicit drug, peyote, during religious rituals. It is important to note that all Supreme Court rulings set precedents that are frequently abused. Convicts sued, for instance, on the basis of this law, that their sincerely held religious beliefs demanded that they have a steak dinner once a week. A Quaker woman sued under this law to be exempt from income tax, since a good part of it is used for military purposes. Many frivolous lawsuits were challenged at taxpayers' expense. Thanks to Burwell vs Hobby Lobby, there will undoubtedly be more such cases.
My conscience will now provide four reasons why this decision is very bad. The list is not meant to be exhaustive.
1. Sincerely Held Religious Beliefs
The Court upheld that "closely held for profit corporations" are not required to provide contraception under the Affordable Care Act if doing so violates "sincerely held religious beliefs" (Justice Kennedy.) Do we really want the justices on the Supreme Court to decide which religious beliefs are sincere and which are not? I think not. As mentioned previously, rulings set precedents--there are surely to be challenges to extend "religious freedom" beyond family-owned businesses and to grant exceptions for more than contraception. What if a family-owned business of faith-healers decides not to cover antibiotics? The possibilities for abuse are legion!
2. Accommodation Can Go Too Far
America has a long and (mostly) admirable tradition of accommodating religious beliefs. I will give you a good example from my experience in pediatrics. I was once involved in testifying against a group called "Dissatisfied Parents Together (DPT)," which held the erroneous belief that vaccines were the cause of much misery while, in fact, they prevent it. I am a pediatrician and will let you in on a dirty--actually clean--little secret. Maryland, the state in which I practice, allowed exemptions from vaccines only for members of religions whose teachings specifically forbade vaccination. (At that time, there were only two.) Advocates for religious freedom considered the law to be too restrictive; it was overturned. Now, anyone who has a "bona fide religious conviction" that vaccines are wrong can get an exemption even if they don't belong to any specific denomination. Here's the secret: we don't tell our patients that. The schools exclude those whose shots are delinquent. We don't tell them about the easy exemption; if we did and it became popular, children would suffer terribly. When I trained in medicine in the early seventies, crippling and fatal cases of meningitis were commonplace. Thanks to vaccines, they are now extremely rare. If the "religious" exemption were frequently used, decency would demand that this loophole be closed.
We doctors, for the most part, are only against religious freedom when it interferes with the common good. Imposing the Hobby Lobby's parochial beliefs on others certainly doesn't foster the common good. Let me give you an example. A diabetic woman, unable to use regular contraceptives, is prescribed an I.U.D by her doctor. It is denied. She gets pregnant and dies from complications of diabetes. This could happen!
Should we expand accommodation for religious beliefs to include imposing those beliefs on others when they might cause great harm? I think not.
3. When Religious Beliefs are Rigid, Should Accommodation be Soft?
Contrary to what many think, the Hobby Lobby, run by a fundamentalist Christian family, does not oppose all forms of contraception. They are vehemently opposed to abortion. They believe that intrauterine devices and the morning after pill induce abortion. Science disagrees. Pregnancy begins when the fertilized egg become implanted in the womb, not before. The owners of Hobby Lobby assert, presumably--and correctly--that fertilization occurs before implantation. Yet fertilized eggs can exist in a Petri Dish as well as in the fallopian tubes--Pregnancy, therefore, begins with implantation.
The Hobby Lobby family claims that their refusal is a form of, in their words, Standing Up for Jesus Christ. This implies that virtually all scientists are Sitting Down Against Him. This is nonsense. Life is sometimes quite ambiguous, whether one likes it or not. Shouldn't the Hobby Lobby family be sufficiently humble--a religious virtue--to consider that they might be wrong when so many good people--including good, religious people--are convinced they are? Self-righteous rigidity--is this what true religion is about?
Again, should the law accommodate this rigidity when it can cause great harm? Again, I think not.
4. The Poor Are Hit the Hardest
If contraception--Catholic bishops think virtually forms of contraception are evil--are not covered, it is the poor who will suffer the most. The rich will always be able to obtain all forms of birth control. Contraception, of course, prevents unwanted pregnancies which otherwise might lead to abortion. The poor are having increasing difficulties obtaining abortions in certain states. The rich can always take a trip North! Is this fair?
All right, it's not the Dread Scott case. Yet it's right for conscience to stand up for the common good and to dread its outcome--What's wrong with that gang of five?
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