Will the Roberts Court Follow Its Own Religious-Freedom Precedent?
If the conservative justices uses the same logic they have in the past, Hobby Lobby's case against the contraceptive mandate doesn't stand a chance.
Feb 19 2014, 11:04 AM ET
Garrett Epps
The cases challenging the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive mandate challenge the conservative majority on the Court: Will they respect precedent if it pushes them toward upholding the mandate, or brush by it in their eagerness to carve out a religious exception?” Last week, I pointed out a Burger-era precedent, United States v. Lee, that should dispose of the case entirely. But to today’s conservatives, the Burger Court is so, well, 20th century. My own sense of this Court is that the majority may be willing to junk its jurisprudence in their eagerness to gut the Affordable Care Act.
But here’s a tougher question: Will the majority abide by its own precedent?
If so, Hobby Lobby and the other challengers don’t even get out of the starting gate. The Burger, Rehnquist, and Roberts Courts have all been clear: These plaintiffs have not suffered any injury worthy of redress under the Constitution.
Hobby Lobby and the others object to the ACA’s requirement that they provide health insurance to their employees that covers a set range of health services, including all contraception options currently approved as safe. Among those are medicines that the plaintiffs believe may prevent fertilized eggs from implanting in the uterus. In their belief, any fertilized egg represents a human life, and when such an egg does not implant, a death has occurred.
http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/02/will-the-roberts-court-follow-its-own-religious-freedom-precedent/283917/
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