Merged Hobby lobby and the slippery slope/SCOTUS decision

[MontagK505]

Other organizations don't have to follow it if they have similar religious objections. The ruling allows for people to follow their faith. It doesn't endorse the faith or establish a religion.

Allowing someone to spew vile words isn't the same as endorsing those words.

Why should their "faith" exempt them from following rules that, others who don't share or have a similar religious ideology, are required to?

 

[MontagK505]

Where's the laughing dog, in response to that strawman?

Do you understand 'closely held'?

Why should "closely held" exempt an employer from following rules that others have to? Suppose the majority share holders of a corporation decide to limit healthcare coverage based on their religious ideology? What about the "faith" of these shareholders? They could always sell their stock, but then the owners of Hobby Lobby can always sell their business if they don't like the rules.

 

[shuize]

Why should their "faith" exempt them from following rules that, others who don't share or have a similar religious ideology, are required to?

Because federal law says so.

The Religious Freedom Restoration Act (1993) says that governments should not substantially burden religious exercise without compelling justification.

Here is the quote from the Hobby Lobby case:

In order to ensure broad protection for religious liberty, RFRA provides that "Government shall not substantially burden a person's exercise of religion even if the burden results from a rule of general applicability." If the Government substantially burdens a person's exercise of religion, under the Act that person is entitled to an exemption from the rule unless the Government "demonstrates that application of the burden to the person-(1) is in furtherance of a compelling governmental interest; and (2) is the least restrictive means of furthering that compelling governmental interest."

Anyone with a passing interest in constitutional law will recognize the standard strict scrutiny test used by the courts when government infringes on a fundamental right.

...Suppose the majority share holders of a corporation decide to limit healthcare coverage based on their religious ideology? What about the "faith" of these shareholders?

Unlike the case with Hobby Lobby, it is doubtful this would pass the sincere belief test. However, even it did, "all healthcare" is a very different argument than "four abortifacients."

The more I read about this case, the more the ruling does not strike me as particularly suprising: The law at issue is quite clear and the government already grants religious based exemptions for nonprofit corporations on this very issue.

 

[Kestrel]

Unlike the case with Hobby Lobby, it is doubtful this would pass the sincere belief test. However, even it did, "all healthcare" is a very different argument than "four abortifacients."

The more I read about this case, the more the ruling does not strike me as particularly suprising: The law at issue is quite clear and the government already grants religious based exemptions for nonprofit corporations on this very issue.

The Supreme Court ruling species that any contraceptive could be rejected by a closely held corporation on religious grounds. It's also clear from the ruling that belief trumps science, the four contraceptives Hobby Lobby objected to do not in fact cause abortions.

Religious beliefs do not have to be sensible or reasonable in order to be sincerely held. Most religious faiths believe things that are objectively insane. What makes them seem reasonable is familiarity.

The logic of this ruling is applicable to any sincerely held religious belief. A Rastafarian boss can object to insurance covering blood transfusions. A JW boss can object to vaccinations. And a Christian Scientist can object to insurance covering chemotherapy or surgery. The impact of these objections based on the religion held by the boss falls on employees who may not share his or her faith.

If a person objects to a medical procedure on religious grounds, they are free to say no. Having insurance that covers contraception or blood transfusions or surgery does not mean you have to accept any of these treatments. But in a free society, why should your access to medical care depend on the religious faith of your employer?

 

[Kestrel]

A reminder of how effective low cost contraception can be at solving a social problem:

A state health initiative to reduce teen birth rates by providing more than 30,000 contraceptive devices at low or no cost has led to a 40 percent drop in five years, Gov. John Hickenlooper said Thursday.
…

That rate has fallen from 37 births per 1,000 girls in 2009 to 22 in 2013, officials said.

The teen abortion rate dropped 35 percent from 2009 to 2012 in those counties where the initiative is in place, Hickenlooper said.

http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26085784/colorado-teen-birth-rates-drop-state-hands-out

 

[AlBell]

Why should "closely held" exempt an employer from following rules that others have to? Suppose the majority share holders of a corporation decide to limit healthcare coverage based on their religious ideology? What about the "faith" of these shareholders? They could always sell their stock, but then the owners of Hobby Lobby can always sell their business if they don't like the rules.

Ergo, no, you don't understand 'closely held'.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

All reports that I've seen is that Hobby Lobby starts off the day in every store with a prayer and has for a long time. To me that says that they do believe in their religion and apply it on a regular basis. As to motives, I don't know but the decision wasn't about any other motives so that's moot.

Yes, they are right wing Christians. I didn't say they weren't. That they are religious is one thing. That they didn't care their employees' medical insurance covered Plan B until the Affordable Care Act and they still don't care they have investments in the manufacture of the things they pretend to have a religious objection to is quite another.

Except that Peyote is allowed for Native Americans so I'm not sure what exactly you're protesting here. It's regulated to make sure that only Native Americans get to get the legal pass but it's not denied for those who qualify under religious rules.

Court strikes a blow to religious freedom

In a blow to Native Americans — whose religious traditions predate the U.S. Constitution — the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 on April 17, that there is no constitutional right to use peyote as part of religious rituals. Peyote, which contains the hallucinogenic drug mescaline, is a central part of Indian religious ritual. The federal government and 23 states permit peyote to be used for that purpose.
The Supreme Court case involved two Oregon men, Galen W. Black and Alfred C. Smith, who were denied unemployment benefits after they were fired from their jobs at a drug and alcohol rehabilitation program. They were fired because they ingested peyote at a ceremony of the Native American Church, of which they were members.

In rejecting the men's claim that Oregon's law barring peyote use under all circumstances violates their religious freedom, Justice Antonin Scalia, in writing for the majority, said that the First Amendment freedom of religion does not allow individuals to break the law: "We have never held that an individual's beliefs excuse him from compliance with an otherwise valid law prohibiting conduct that the state is free to regulate." He said it would be "courting anarchy" to create exceptions every time a religious group claims that a law infringes on its practices.

That says it all doesn't it? Their religion vs Scalia's own beliefs: not the same. The man's hypocrisy knows no bounds.

You'll have to restate your position given you had that underlying fact about peyote wrong.

The difference is that Hobby Lobby doesn't want to facilitate it en mass. They cannot stop any employee from buying a big bottle of booze every other day (and just like non-religious companies they probably don't want their employees showing up drunk) but the decision means that they don't have to go buy it by the pallet just to get it on the cheap either. The money an employee makes is theirs, the employer has no right to tell them how to spend it or use it. That is the difference, it's a buffer between what the employer wants and what the employee wants. It doesn't stop the employee from buying that bottle of booze on their own dime it just means that the employer doesn't have to blatantly facilitate it.

It's arbitrary to say a payment in cash the employee then spends vs a payment as an insurance premium the employee then spends are qualitatively different.

 

[Neally]

When a religion's exercise is trampling on other people's rights, it can no longer be free.

We've been through this already. No one has come up with religious or other rights that have been trampled on by this decision.

Why should their "faith" exempt them from following rules that, others who don't share or have a similar religious ideology, are required to?

Why don't you read the decision rather than ask these questions that are covered therein and have been gone over multiple times in this thread?

 

[I Ratant]

Until the definition includes something that you do.

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Those are already on the list.

 

[I Ratant]

...or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;[/INDENT]

...

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Would child sacrifice to Baal be exempt from a murder charge?

 

[I Ratant]

There are two separate issues.

1) The evidence suggests Hobby Lobby is making a disingenuous claim about their motives and religious beliefs. That is the issue I was addressing.

2) The SCOTUS ruling, which Ziggy believes confirmed the government could not prohibit the free exercise of religion. The problem with that is it would seem to be a very selective ruling confirming protection for some Catholics and some other Christian sects, while the court has not had a precedent of protecting other religious practices such as allowing Native Americans to use peyote which had been part of their religious ceremonies.

Do you expect Muslims to be granted the right to murder wayward children claiming it is within their religious beliefs?..

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No one can take their mouthy teenager to the city gates, denounce him, and have the hangers-on there stone the kid to death.. It's in the Book!
Sometimes, discarding out the old ways was not good.

 

[Magyar]

Where's the laughing dog, in response to that strawman?

Do you understand 'closely held'?

Well i dont know if sherman understands closely held, but its OBVIOUS. That you're CLUELESS!

Here is how the IRS. Definines closely held.
http://www.irs.gov/Help-&-Resources...-Employed,-Other-Business/Entities/Entities-5

This means 52% of all US employees work for a closely held company and just slightly more than half of all economic output in the US is generated by companies that are closely held! That means this decision can effect as many as 80 million people! And lets not forget that while hobby lobby was espacially selected as the poster child for this lawsuit there were 80 other companies part of the lawsuit. So pretening that this jsut about hobby lobby is straight up lying.


Further your pretense, along with scotus and the religious loons that something that could effect a majority of the us employed is narrow is well - laughably stupid!

 

[sunmaster14]

Yes, they are right wing Christians. I didn't say they weren't. That they are religious is one thing. That they didn't care their employees' medical insurance covered Plan B until the Affordable Care Act and they still don't care they have investments in the manufacture of the things they pretend to have a religious objection to is quite another.

They claim they did care about Plan B. They just didn't know it was in their health plan's formulary until it was pointed out to them. As for whether their investments are proscribed by their beliefs, that's really up to them, don't you think? If you're going to argue that their religious beliefs are illogical, well, then maybe your problem is religion in general. Are you sure you want to go that route?

Court strikes a blow to religious freedom
That says it all doesn't it? Their religion vs Scalia's own beliefs: not the same. The man's hypocrisy knows no bounds.

You'll have to restate your position given you had that underlying fact about peyote wrong.

And you'll have to do a lot more research before you even reach a basic understanding of the issues involved here. Sam.I.Am is correct about peyote, and the RFRA was specifically passed to protect religious freedoms in light of the ruling that you cite (which determined that the 1st Amendment did not protect religion from the effects of laws of general applicability). The Hobby Lobby ruling is based 100% on the interpretation of the RFRA and 0% on the 1st Amendment.

Would you like to restate your position given that you had that underlying fact wrong?

 

[MontagK505]

We've been through this already. No one has come up with religious or other rights that have been trampled on by this decision.

Why don't you read the decision rather than ask these questions that are covered therein and have been gone over multiple times in this thread?

You are right to criticize. I meant the question rhetorically. The effect is to give legal exemptions to federal law based or religious ideology and corporate ownership.

 

[Ziggurat]

Yes, but isn't the effect of this SCOTUS decision is to allow some religious ideologues exemption from portions of the ACA that other employers have to follow? You are excluded from obeying laws that the rest of us have to follow because you embrace a specific religious ideology.

Do you want an exclusion? Do you feel you should have an exclusion? Because if you don't want one, then why should it matter if you don't get one? And if you do want one, why?

If you don't like the fact that the law privileges religious beliefs, go complain to the people who wrote the law, the Congressmen and Senators who passed it, and the president who signed it into law. That wasn't the Supreme Court, there's no point in getting upset at them.

 

[MontagK505]

Do you want an exclusion? Do you feel you should have an exclusion? Because if you don't want one, then why should it matter if you don't get one? And if you do want one, why?

If you don't like the fact that the law privileges religious beliefs, go complain to the people who wrote the law, the Congressmen and Senators who passed it, and the president who signed it into law. That wasn't the Supreme Court, there's no point in getting upset at them.

Do you seriously think the law was written with exemptions like this in mind?
SCOTUS is allowing these exemptions they are the ones responsible.

 

[Neally]

.
Would child sacrifice to Baal be exempt from a murder charge?

What do you think?

Well i dont know if sherman understands closely held, but its OBVIOUS. That you're CLUELESS!

Here is how the IRS. Definines closely held.
http://www.irs.gov/Help-&-Resources...-Employed,-Other-Business/Entities/Entities-5

This means 52% of all US employees work for a closely held company and just slightly more than half of all economic output in the US is generated by companies that are closely held!

OMG!

That means this decision can effect as many as 80 million people!

OMG²!

And lets not forget that while hobby lobby was espacially selected as the poster child for this lawsuit there were 80 other companies part of the lawsuit. So pretening that this jsut about hobby lobby is straight up lying.

Good thing no one is "pretening" that then.

 

[Ziggurat]

2) The SCOTUS ruling, which Ziggy believes confirmed the government could not prohibit the free exercise of religion.

This ruling was not based upon the first amendment. The Supreme Court already ruled (and this case doesn't overturn) that there are significant limits to the free exercise of religion. The RFRA extends religious freedom beyond what the first amendment protects, but it's still not limitless. My point in mentioning the first amendment was to point out the deep and fundamental misunderstanding that a poster had about establishment of religion. This case doesn't actually have anything to do with establishment of religion.

The problem with that is it would seem to be a very selective ruling confirming protection for some Catholics and some other Christian sects, while the court has not had a precedent of protecting other religious practices such as allowing Native Americans to use peyote which had been part of their religious ceremonies.

You reveal your ignorance of history. The RFRA was passed over exactly this issue. Native American use of peyote is not protected under the 1st amendment, but it is protected under the RFRA. And the Supreme Court has ruled on this issue, in Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficente Uniao do Vegetal. They explicitly protected the religious use of a controlled drug in the case of non-Christians.

In other words, everything about the premise of your argument is wrong.

Do you expect Muslims to be granted the right to murder wayward children claiming it is within their religious beliefs?

The Hobby Lobby case does nothing at all to change the scope of the RFRA as applied to individuals. The only thing it changes is that it makes clear that the standards of the RFRA that apply to individuals can still apply to some (but probably not all) groups of people who have incorporated.

Now, do you honestly think that Harry Reid, Joe Biden, and Nancy Pelosi all voted for and Bill Clinton signed into law a bill that would allow Muslims to murder their children on religious groups with impunity? Or is it perhaps possible that the law isn't actually that monumentally stupid, that there's something you perhaps haven't noticed about the law which would still allow it to prohibit such acts? Because if it's the latter, well, whatever allowed the government to prohibit such acts before the Hobby Lobby case, it's STILL IN EFFECT.

The interpretation of just who is purchasing the birth control when money is paid into an insurance pool also needs to be considered.

No, actually, it doesn't, and least not by the court. Just like the Supreme Court doesn't need to consider whether peyote actually helps Native Americans commune with the spirits.

How does it differ if Hobby Lobby pays an employee who then buys birth control with the money (or let's say an abortion) and Hobby Lobby provides wages to the employee in the form of an insurance payment and subsequently the employee then has an abortion?

From Hobby Lobby's perspective, the difference is that, while the money they paid might have been used for a sinful purpose, the employee wasn't paid for that sinful purpose, they were paid for their labor which was not sinful. The subsequent use of that money is not the moral responsibility of Hobby Lobby. But if they're paying for birth control which is sinful, they're paying for sin, and they have moral responsibility for that.

Look, you don't have to agree with their conception of either sin or of moral responsibility. But if you don't understand yet what their view is, then you're just not trying to understand.

Clearly on these 5-4 decisions, things are not as clear cut as is usually claimed.

If you knew that it's not clear-cut, that there must be some decent argument in favor of the ruling if 5 justices went for it, then why would you ask stupid questions like your hypothetical Muslims murdering their children,

Edited by Lisa Simpson: 

Edited to remove personal attack.

 

[Ziggurat]

When a religion's exercise is trampling on other people's rights, it can no longer be free.

You have no fundamental right to have your birth control of choice paid for by your employer. To the extent that this is a statutory right, well, it's a statutory right which just lost to another statutory right, but one of them had to, so the logic of your argument was going to fail one way or another.

 

[Ziggurat]

Do you seriously think the law was written with exemptions like this in mind?

What they had in mind is rather beside the point. What the law says is what matters. The law created these exemptions, regardless of whether Congress understood what it was doing.

Furthermore, similar exemptions were already given for quite a number of groups without even a court fight over it. Adding Hobby Lobby to the list changes less than you seem to think.

SCOTUS is allowing these exemptions they are the ones responsible.

Yes, they are responsible. Responsible for upholding the law.

If Congress doesn't like the effects of the law that they passed, well, the fix is easy: change the law. This ruling wasn't based upon the 1st amendment, it's entirely within Congress's power to simply remove the religious protections they created.