The Supreme Court unanimously agreed to send the lawsuit from religious organizations objecting to the Obamacare contraceptive requirement back to a lower court. Apparently, the justices think they have found a solution that would prevent the religious groups from feeling “complicit in sin” by notifying the government about their objections, so as to force their insurance companies to provide the coverage for free. The solution seems to be (this hasn’t been made explicit) to have the employees, rather than the organization, ask for the coverage.
From Supreme Court Sends Latest Obamacare Challenge Back To Lower Courts : The Two-Way : NPR:
Saying they now have new information that significantly changes the case before them, the Supreme Court justices sidestepped a constitutional decision on the latest Obamacare challenge and sent the government and the religious organizations back to the drawing board.
In a unanimous decision, the court said it was not deciding the central question in the case: whether Obamacare’s contraceptive mandate substantially burdens some organizations’ right to exercise their religion.
As we reported when the case was argued, the Affordable Care Act does not require religiously affiliated employers to provide contraceptives to their employees. It does, however, require them to write a letter notifying the government that they object to the coverage and who their insurance provider is. That provider would then offer contraceptive coverage to the employees.
The organizations suing the government argued that writing the letter made them “complicit in sin.”
After the case was argued before the Supreme Court, the justices asked the government if “contraceptive coverage could be provided to petitioners’ employees, through petitioners’ insurance companies, without any such notice from petitioners.”
According to the court opinion out Monday, the government said it was a feasible option, and the religious organizations suing said they could live with a solution where they “need to do nothing more than contract for a plan that does not include coverage for some or all forms of contraception.”
[Keep reading. . .]
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