Judicial Watch Favorably Reacts to Supreme Court's Decision on HHS Contraceptive Mandate
Contact: Jill Farrell, Judicial Watch, 202-646-5188
WASHINGTON, June 30, 2014 /Standard Newswire/
-- Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton made the following statement
today in response to the United States Supreme Court's "Hobby Lobby"
holding that the contraceptive mandate, as applied to closely held
corporations, is unlawful. The five-four decision, written by Justice
Samuel Alito, sided with family-run businesses that regard some forms
of contraception, especially those that can cause abortions, as
immoral.
"A battle has been won in the
defense of the First Amendment right to religious freedom. The Obama
administration has been waging war on several fronts against the
Christian Church. This Obama assault, through Obamacare, was without
modern precedent. Judicial Watch today applauds the high court's
decision to repel the administration's overreach, which would have had
Americans to violate their consciences or lose their livelihoods."
Judicial Watch filed an amicus curiae brief
on January 28 with the United States Supreme Court in support of a
religious liberty challenge by the retail chain Hobby Lobby to the
Obamacare "contraceptive mandate" (Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services, et al. v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., et al. (No.13-354)).
The Judicial Watch's brief argues that
the contraceptive mandate violates provisions of the 1993 Religious
Freedom Restoration Act, which, in accordance with the First Amendment
protection of the free exercise of religion, prohibits the federal
government from substantially burdening religious exercise without
compelling justification.
Terming the Department of Health &
Human Services (HHS) mandate an "unprecedented grab for power," the
Judicial Watch amicus brief argues:
The challenged regulation ... is
not simply the consequence of poor political choices; it is the
product of a dangerous entanglement of Congress and an Executive agency
that ultimately tramples on religious liberties.
In an unprecedented grab for
power, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services ("HHS") has not
only unilaterally authored, enacted, and changed the contraceptive
mandate, but it now seeks to redefine a separate act of Congress -- the
Religious Freedom Restoration Act -- to preserve its power grab. This
simply cannot stand.
Judicial Watch also argues that
the owners of Hobby Lobby and other businesses should not have to
choose between "fidelity to [their] faith or the imposition of
unimaginable fines." The brief also reminds the Court of James
Madison's words in the Federalist Papers: "an elective despotism was
not the government we fought for."
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