Hobby Lobby decision from SCOTUS, Hobby Lobby Wins

LOL, moral tolerance, not something given to the religious where the morals came from. I forget, government is some people's God.

 

Plutocracy has truly become the law of the land. I wonder how long conservatives will celebrate if a Muslim owned company demands female employees wear hijabs.

 

Strawman. The length libs go whining to protect the heavy hand of government.

 

How is the employer denying an individual the ability to exercise their liberty in this case? Can the employees of this business buy this product at a local drug store if they wish any time they wish?

 

Government is not denying and disparaging Individual Liberty under our form of Capitalism, this time.

 

LOL, yeah, that is why they didn't force people to buy a private product or fine them if they didn't.

 

But it's a tax.

 

5 Major Takeaways From The Hobby Lobby Decision
June 30, 2014 By Sean Davis

The Supreme Court this morning issued its ruling in the Hobby Lobby case. At issue was whether closely held companies like Hobby Lobby could be forced by the government to provide abortifacient coverage to its employees, in defiance of its owners’ deeply held religious beliefs.

In a 5-4 ruling written by Justice Samuel Alito, the Supreme Court ruled that Hobby Lobby and other closely held companies do not have to provide contraceptive coverage that conflicts with the religious beliefs of the companies’ owners. Here are 5 major takeaways from the Supreme Court’s decision.

1) The government must provide religious accommodations to for-profit companies

Corporations aren’t people, but they are owned by people, and the religious beliefs of those people must be protected regardless of how those people choose to incorporate their businesses. The court ruled today that the accommodations provided to non-profit religious organizations by the Religious Freedom Restoration Act also apply to for-profit companies.

“[W]e hold that a federal regulation’s restriction on the activities of a for-profit closely held corporation must comply with [the Religious Freedom Restoration Act,” Alito wrote in the majority decision.

It’s a big win for religious liberty and against the belief that your faith no longer matters once you decide to open a business.

2) The decision only applies to “closely held” companies, not all corporations

Although the decision represents a complete victory for Hobby Lobby and the other plaintiffs in the case, it does not recognize a carte blanche right for all for-profit corporations. Alito’s opinion only recognizes the right of “closely held” companies to operate in accordance with their owners’ religious values.

A massive, publicly held corporation that trades on the stock market and is overwhelmingly owned by hedge funds, retirement plans, university endowments, and retail investors would likely not be granted the same protections by the Supreme Court:

3) The decision only applies to the contraceptive mandate, not to other government mandates like vaccinations

One of the concerns raised by several liberal justices during oral arguments was that if Hobby Lobby could get a religious exemption from the contraceptive mandate, then what would stop a company from demanding an exemption from a vaccination mandate? Or from a mandate prohibiting discrimination?

Alito and the other four concurring justices made short work of that argument. According to the Supreme Court:

4) The Obama administration could have used other, less restrictive ways to provide contraceptive coverage

One of the main reasons the Obama administration’s arguments failed to convince five justices is that the federal government did not necessarily need to mandate employer-provided contraceptive coverage in order to ensure access to contraceptive coverage. For example, rather than mandating employer coverage, the government could have easily established its own program to provide or pay for contraceptive coverage:

5) Dropping coverage altogether to avoid the mandate was not a viable option for Hobby Lobby

One ridiculous argument offered during oral arguments by Justices Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor was that the religious owners of the companies could just drop coverage altogether, thereby entirely avoiding the contraceptive mandate. Sure, there would be a hefty tax, but that’s too bad. Sometimes you just have to pay taxes.

That reasoning was roundly rejected by the five-person Supreme Court majority. Why? Because the Hobby Lobby owners noted that they also felt compelled by their religious beliefs to provide health insurance to their employees — including coverage for 16 different types of contraception (Hobby Lobby’s objection was to mandated abortifacient coverage). Therefore, the solution proposed by Kagan and Sotomayor was no solution at all:

http://thefederalist.com/2014/06/30/5-major-takeaways-from-the-hobby-lobby-decision/

 

Just so everyone understands:

Huge violation of rights: Employers with a specific ownership structure can opt to not include a select few products from a heath insurance plan. (Products which are still extremely available, acquirable through multiple other means, and for the most part are relatively inexpensive.)

Perfectly Ok: Everyone everywhere must purchase a specific product as a condition of being alive.

 

I'm still waiting for someone to tell me how people are having their freedom limited or restricted in any way.

 

under his family plan
you mean they were covered, now if he worked there his policy would no longer cover it for them under his family plan

...

 

No, a tax is different in that the government takes our money, and then the government buys things with it (some things which everyone might not agree on). In this case, the government is making the business buy things they don't agree with. And the reason it came to this, is that the government knew that they couldn't pass the ACA as a tax. So they developed a complicated scheme to get the money they needed to bail out the health insurance industry (like many other industries recently bailed out) by making private individuals pay for the bail out directly. They should have been honest with the American people, and told them this was a major tax increase, and they should have had the political courage to legislate that tax.

 

Oh, that pesky food. Always robbing me of my money.....

 

Is there a government mandate to buy food?

 

The administration argued to the Supreme Court that the so called "fines" included in the ACA were in fact a tax. That was the reason Justice Roberts voted the way he did, The Federal government has the right to tax.

It is also true that when Republicans stated that Obamacare was a massive tax increase, the administration stated it was not a tax at all. Then it was quite odd when the administration changed positions and said it was.

 

There are laws against suicide, so the answer is yes.

And when it comes to children, the law gets more specific.

It's just common sense. If everyone had common sense, we wouldn't need laws, would we?

Let's remember exactly what I was replying to:
"Everyone everywhere must purchase a specific product as a condition of being alive."

No mention of government mandate there. IJS

 

You can choose not to buy food and still be in compliance of the law. There are other means of obtaining food. You also do not need to prove to the government that you have food.

 

As the saying goes "there's no such thing as a free lunch". Sure there are people who cannot afford to purchase their own food; the same can be said about health care too!

The fact is that in any society, all people enjoy certain privileges of membership of the society even when they contribute nothing. I have no problem with self-professed "libertarians" who are willing to go off to a desert island to enjoy total freedom. But when people who enjoy these free default benefits complain about being asked to pay a small token amount to carry at least part of their fair share, that's just being an ingrate. I can tolerate ingrates too, but I don't have to dignify their cause with any notion of legitimacy.

 

So you agree with the concurring (Kennedy) opinion then?

 

How is it a strawman? You guys always seem so scared of islamic extremism. This is opening it an opportunity.

 

I haven't read Justice Kennedy's opinion. Has it been published? If so, can you point me to it?

 

When SCOTUS decisions are made public, the court decision along with any concurring and dissenting opinions are published on the SCOTUS web site.

http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/slipopinions.aspx?Term=13

I would promote going there from time to time and looking at the cases and decisions that don't make the news. It's educational, especially so when you see how much the Justices agree. The media would have us think it's always left vs right on the Court.

 

The Hobby Lobby case was a statutory not a constitutional ruling. It was based on the RFRA signed by Clinton in 1993 not the first amendment.

 

Hobby Lobby is not demanding anything of women, the government is demanding something from Hobby Lobby. An Islamic company demanding women wear some religious garb IS demanding something of women.

If Hobby Lobby was firing women because they had an abortion, you might have a point.

 

women's health being a burden was not even close to what was decided. It was decided that forcing someone to provide contraception that violates their religion is an undue burden on religious freedoms. Do you really not believe in religious freedom?