I don’t often wax political publicly, especially not in my blogs, but today I find myself stunned by the decision that the Supreme Court made allowing corporations to opt out of covering certain contraceptives if it interferes with “closely held” religious beliefs. There are so many issues with that statement alone, never mind the fact that the spirit of the Constitution was just trampled upon, that I needed to put finger to keyboard to really parse out the meat and meaning of the issue.
Let’s pretend for a moment that this issue has NOTHING to do with contraceptives, and instead pretend this suit was filed over a Hindu or Jewish employer refusing to pay for a heart valve replacement because the valve in question would be coming from a cow or pig. This cow/pig valve operates just like a human heart valve and will save MY LIFE. It is going into MY BODY. Will my theoretical Hindu/Jewish employer be allowed to refuse to cover that procedure? If we are following precedent as the judicial system of the US does (in most states except Louisiana), and I’m unwilling to have a mechanical valve because I don’t want to be on anticoagulants for the rest of my life, the answer should be “Yes”.
EXCEPT, that the Supreme Court put language into the decision preventing employers from denying coverage for other medical procedures and medications.
“This decision concerns only the contraceptive mandate and should not be understood to hold that all insurance mandates, e.g., for vaccinations or blood transfusions, must necessarily fall if they conflict with the employer’s religious beliefs.”
So a Christian Scientist employer can’t refuse to cover vaccinations because it goes against their “closely held” belief, but a Christian employer can refuse to cover contraceptives?
This seems a little discriminatory to me. Which, luckily for me the Supreme Court added some verbiage to the “Burwell v. Hobby Lobby” opinion to address that very issue. The opinion read that the ruling does not “provide a shield for employers who might cloak illegal discrimination as a religious practice.”
I’m certainly glad we cleared up that discrimination issue. I feel much better knowing that I’ll be discriminated against because of my ovaries rather than the fact that I won’t let my child have a life saving blood transfusion.
But, enough about that, let’s circle back to the hot button issue of the day — contraceptives. Under this ruling, Hobby Lobby will stay pay for the pill, they just won’t pay for an IUD or Plan B, because as Hobby Lobby maintains, both those types of medicine cause an abortion.
Except that they don’t, actually.
I have no issue with the owners of Hobby Lobby believing that life begins at conception. What I do have a problem with is Hobby Lobby pretending they went to medical school, and not arts and crafts camp. You see, devices like an IUD and pills like Plan B, stop a female from ovulating. in essence it stops the egg and the sperm from ever partying together. It doesn’t work if you are already pregnant. Hobby Lobby, if you have taken a break from glitter and googly-eyes, and by chance are reading this, let me repeat myself — It doesn’t work if you are already pregnant.
So, Hobby Lobby wants to opt out government mandated essential medical care coverage they have somehow managed to confused with abortions. Fine. I don’t want the government to subsidize oil companies, while Exxon and Shell turn in record profits. I also don’t want to pay for the imprisonment of people serving sentences for minor drug crimes. But I don’t get to opt out of that section of my taxes just because I don’t like what the government does with the money. Yes, I would rather my taxes went to things like education rather than defense, but there isn’t a box where I can check “books not bazookas” because I don’t get to earmark my taxes.
But you know where I can earmark how my money is used. In my 401k retirement investment account.
And so can Hobby Lobby.
As a company with such sincere, closely held religious beliefs I would assume they took a good look at where they were investing. After all, Hobby Lobby took this suit to the Supreme Court of the United State of America because their First Amendment Rights were being trampled on. It’s pretty easy to figure out where your money is being invested. In fact, Hobby Lobby is required to know where their money is invested for the benefit of their employees. Somehow these sincerely held religious beliefs didn’t come into play until it was brought to their attention that contraceptive coverage was costing Hobby Lobby money. It certainly didn’t appear to be an issue for Hobby Lobby when the company was investing 73 million dollars (or 75%) of the company’s 401k plans in nine companies like Teva and Pfizer, both who make and sell the contraceptives they are allowed to opt out of paying for.
Maybe they didn’t know that is where their 401k investments were placed?
Maybe not.
Things fall through the cracks.
But I find it interesting that a company who is willing to take an issue to the highest court in the land didn’t at least take a gander at where the company’s 401k plan, that Hobby Lobby very generously matches I might add, was being invested.
This inconsistency leads me to the most crucial issue (for me at least), of this ruling. How are we ever going to determine a “sincerely held” religious belief? I can’t even determine if the guy I went out with last night really meant it when he said he’d call. Clearly, Hobby Lobby voiced this “sincerely held” belief, but they weren’t exactly practicing what they were very loudly preaching. And unless the Supreme Court has a direct line to St. Peter, there is no way to know if a “sincerely held” religious belief is truly that.
With this ruling, the Supreme Court has made discriminating against someone with a uterus legal, just because their employer has a vague understanding of the medicine behind a type of contraception. Stopping access to contraceptives isn’t going to stop people from having abortions, which seems to be Hobby Lobby’s goal. Instead it leads to a host of unintended consequences, which I won’t bore you with just now.
Instead I’ll leave you with one of my Junior High School teacher’s favorite sayings was “My rights end where your nose begins.” Congratulations Supreme Court, you’ve managed to punch me in the uterus and call it protection of someone else’s First Amendment Rights.
Citations
Click to access 13-354_olp1.pdf
Hobby Lobby’s Hypocrisy: The Company’s Retirement Plan Invests in Contraception Manufacturers
Criggerpalooza! 
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