{"id":2616,"date":"2013-03-14T08:06:00","date_gmt":"2013-03-14T08:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/news\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/"},"modified":"2013-03-14T08:06:00","modified_gmt":"2013-03-14T08:06:00","slug":"descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/","title":{"rendered":"Descendant of founding American files 50th mandate lawsuit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Washington D.C., Mar 14, 2013 \/ 02:06 am (CNA\/EWTN News<\/a>).- A Baptist small business owner whose ancestors fought religious persecution as founding Americans has filed the 50th lawsuit challenging the federal contraception mandate.<\/p>\n

\tThe Thomas More Law Center, which is handling the case, said that Thomas Beckwith\u2019s ancestors endured \u201cthe hardships of a storm tossed ocean voyage,\u201d coming the America \u201cin 1626 to escape religious persecution from England.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\u201cOne hundred and fifty years later, one of his ancestors, as a member of the Connecticut militia, fought against the tyrannical British king in the Revolutionary War,\u201d the organization continued.<\/p>\n

\tNow, it said, Beckwith and his family-owned electric company are filing a legal challenge to a federal mandate that constitutes \u201ca new form of tyranny and religious persecution.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tBeckwith is the owner of Beckwith Electric, founded as a family business in 1967. The company, which has 168 full-time employees, produces micro-processor-based technology for power system generators, powers lines and transformers. The company also offers energy saving and voltage reduction strategies.<\/p>\n

\tBeckwith has now filed the 50th religious freedom lawsuit challenging the Obama administration\u2019s contraception mandate. Issued under the authority of the Affordable Care Act, the mandate requires employers to offer health insurance plans covering contraception, sterilization and some drugs that can cause early abortions.<\/p>\n

\tA Southern Baptist, Beckwith believes that life begins at conception, and his religious convictions prevent him from offering or in any way participating in the provision of abortion or emergency contraception, which can end the life of a newly-conceived human embryo.<\/p>\n

\tIf Beckwith does not comply with the mandate, he could face over $6 million in fines per year.<\/p>\n

\tThe Southern Baptist Convention strongly opposes the federal requirement, saying that it is \u201ca blatant assault on faith.\u201d The convention\u2019s declaration against the mandate adds that \u201cthe Bible is clear about the sanctity of human life,\u201d which is threatened by some of the mandated drugs that can cause early abortions.<\/p>\n

\tAccording to the Thomas More Law Center, Beckwith lives his faith in both his personal life and his work, striving to \u201clead the company under God\u2019s direction and by God\u2019s principles,\u201d and offering a full range of generous employee benefits including health, dental, vision and life insurance, profit sharing, educational and travel assistance, paid time off and gym memberships.<\/p>\n

\tThe company also provides spiritual support for employees facing the death of a loved one, family problems or other crises. According to the Thomas More Law Center, chaplains are a visible figure within Beckwith\u2019s company, visiting the organization \u201con a weekly basis to build caring relationships with the employees.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tRichard Thompson, president and chief counsel of the Thomas More Law Center, said that through the mandate, the government has \u201cdeclared war on people of Faith.\u201d\u00a0
\n\t\u00a0
\n\t\u201cThis is a case about religious freedom,\u201d said the lawsuit, which was filed March 12 in a federal court in Florida.<\/p>\n

\tIt quoted the third U.S. President Thomas Jefferson, founding father and author of the Declaration of Independence, who said, \u201cNo provision in our Constitution ought to be dearer to man than that which protects the rights of conscience against the enterprises of the civil authority.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n<\/a>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Washington D.C., Mar 14, 2013 \/ 02:06 am (CNA\/EWTN News).- A Baptist small business owner whose ancestors fought religious persecution as founding Americans has filed the 50th lawsuit challenging the federal contraception mandate.<\/p>\n

\tThe Thomas More Law…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1031,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-us"],"yoast_head":"\nDescendant of founding American files 50th mandate lawsuit<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Washington D.C., Mar 14, 2013 \/ 02:06 am (CNA\/EWTN News).- A Baptist small business owner whose ancestors fought religious persecution as founding Americans has filed the 50th lawsuit challenging the federal contraception mandate. The Thomas More Law...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Descendant of founding American files 50th mandate lawsuit\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Washington D.C., Mar 14, 2013 \/ 02:06 am (CNA\/EWTN News).- A Baptist small business owner whose ancestors fought religious persecution as founding Americans has filed the 50th lawsuit challenging the federal contraception mandate. The Thomas More Law...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Catholic News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-03-14T08:06:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/catholicnewsagency\/dailynews?d=yIl2AUoC8zA\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"CNA Daily News\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"CNA Daily News\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/\",\"name\":\"Descendant of founding American files 50th mandate lawsuit\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-03-14T08:06:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-03-14T08:06:00+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1\"},\"description\":\"Washington D.C., Mar 14, 2013 \/ 02:06 am (CNA\/EWTN News).- A Baptist small business owner whose ancestors fought religious persecution as founding Americans has filed the 50th lawsuit challenging the federal contraception mandate. The Thomas More Law...\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Descendant of founding American files 50th mandate lawsuit\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/\",\"name\":\"Catholic News\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1\",\"name\":\"CNA Daily News\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"CNA Daily News\"},\"sameAs\":[\"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/author\/cna-daily-news\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Descendant of founding American files 50th mandate lawsuit","description":"Washington D.C., Mar 14, 2013 \/ 02:06 am (CNA\/EWTN News).- A Baptist small business owner whose ancestors fought religious persecution as founding Americans has filed the 50th lawsuit challenging the federal contraception mandate. The Thomas More Law...","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Descendant of founding American files 50th mandate lawsuit","og_description":"Washington D.C., Mar 14, 2013 \/ 02:06 am (CNA\/EWTN News).- A Baptist small business owner whose ancestors fought religious persecution as founding Americans has filed the 50th lawsuit challenging the federal contraception mandate. The Thomas More Law...","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/","og_site_name":"Catholic News","article_published_time":"2013-03-14T08:06:00+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/catholicnewsagency\/dailynews?d=yIl2AUoC8zA"}],"author":"CNA Daily News","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"CNA Daily News","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/","name":"Descendant of founding American files 50th mandate lawsuit","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website"},"datePublished":"2013-03-14T08:06:00+00:00","dateModified":"2013-03-14T08:06:00+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1"},"description":"Washington D.C., Mar 14, 2013 \/ 02:06 am (CNA\/EWTN News).- A Baptist small business owner whose ancestors fought religious persecution as founding Americans has filed the 50th lawsuit challenging the federal contraception mandate. The Thomas More Law...","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2013\/03\/descendant-of-founding-american-files-50th-mandate-lawsuit\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Descendant of founding American files 50th mandate lawsuit"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/","name":"Catholic News","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1","name":"CNA Daily News","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"CNA Daily News"},"sameAs":["http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/author\/cna-daily-news\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2616","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1031"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2616"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2616\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}