The Hobby Lobby decision is one of the more bitter pills liberals get to swallow. The more one delves into the Hobby Lobby decision the more entertaining it gets. Liberals have brought this upon themselves.
The decision bases much on a law called RFRA:
The Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 (RFRA) prohibits the “Government [from] substantially burden[ing] a person’s exercise of religion even if the burden results from a rule of general applicability” unless the Government “demonstrates that application of the burden to the person—(1) is in furtherance of a compelling governmental interest; and (2) is the least restrictive means of furthering that compelling governmental interest.” 42 U. S. C. §§2000bb–1(a), (b). As amended by the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000 (RLUIPA), RFRA covers “any exercise of religion, whether or not compelled by, or central to, a system of religious belief.” §2000cc–5(7)(A).
Let’s review RFRA:
The Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, Pub. L. No. 103-141, 107 Stat. 1488 (November 16, 1993), codified at 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb through 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb-4 (also known as RFRA), is a 1993 United States federal law aimed at preventing laws that substantially burden a person’s free exercise of their religion. The bill was introduced by Howard McKeon of California and Dean Gallo of New Jersey on March 11, 1993.[1] The bill was signed into law by President Bill Clinton and was passed by a unanimous U.S. House and a near unanimous U.S. Senate with three dissenting votes.[2] It was held unconstitutional as applied to the states in the City of Boerne v. Flores decision in 1997, which ruled that the RFRA is not a proper exercise of Congress’s enforcement power. But it continues to be applied to the federal government, for instance in Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficente Uniao do Vegetal, because Congress has broad authority to carve out exemptions from federal laws and regulations that it itself has authorized. In response to City of Boerne v. Flores, some individual states passed State Religious Freedom Restoration Acts that apply to state governments and local municipalities.
Who brought RFRA to us? Chuckie Schumer.
Introduced in the House as H.R. 1308 by Chuck Schumer (D-NY) on March 11, 1993
You know how liberals are always whining about corporations not being “persons”? Well, that’s pretty interesting. Cue the Harvard Law Review
“Why for-profit corporations are RFRA persons”
As noted in the introduction, RFRA prevents unjustified interference with religious exercise by “persons.” The most natural reading of the term “person” in RFRA includes for-profit corporations. Congress passed RFRA in response to Employment Division v. Smith,12 which abandoned application of strict scrutiny to neutral laws burdening religious exercise.13 Because RFRA implements a previous constitutional rule, one could seek the meaning of “person” in constitutional precedent. As Justice Brennan explained, “by 1871, it was well understood that corporations should be treated as natural persons for virtually all purposes of constitutional and statutory analysis.”14 Thus, the Supreme Court has repeatedly held that for-profit corporations are constitutional “persons.”15 Furthermore, the so-called “Dictionary Act,” which defines terms appearing in the U.S. Code, provides that, “unless the context indicates otherwise,” the term “person” includes corporations, partnerships, and other entities, “as well as individuals,” without regard to whether such firms or individuals are engaged in profit-seeking activities.16
Their conclusion?
Simply put, corporate law provides no reason for excluding for-profit corporations from RFRA.
Liberals have lost their minds over this and now are reduced to spewing idiocies. The stupidity is so rampant that there is simply not enough bandwidth to accommodate it. One of my favorites is how this ruling curtails women’s reproductive rights. From one the of the brain dead at Politico:
Conservative men and their disdain for women’s reproductive rights! You bigots on the right won’t stop until it becomes legal to own your wives like property
The ruling in no way affects women’s reproductive rights. That reminds me- when are women’s rights to reproduce ever curtailed? Why are they called “reproductive rights” at all? Should they not be called “Contraceptive rights” instead?
Anyway, here comes the best of all.
Hillary.
Clinton joins the ranks of the undead when she spouts this:
“Just think about this for a minute,” Clinton continued. “It’s the first time that our court has said that a closely held corporation has the rights of a person when it comes to religious freedom. Which means that the…corporation’s employers can impose their religious beliefs on their employees. And of course denying women the right to contraception as part of their health care plan is exactly that. I find it deeply disturbing that we are going in that direction.”
Fun fact: Hilary Clinton is a an absolute liar, but she knows that liberal sycophants are too stupid to learn anything on their own. Hobby Lobby still does provide contraceptive services. They objected to four out of twenty.
KELLY: The National Organization of Women came out today and said, this is outrageous, they said that basically what is happening here is Hobby Lobby doesn’t want to provide American female workers with any birth control. Your thoughts?
RIENZI: It’s not true, first of all. Hobby Lobby provides all sorts of standard birth control, it’s just a small handful of drugs and devices that can cause early abortions that Hobby Lobby doesn’t want to provide.
KELLY: So, it’s four contraceptions out of 20. Just to get the numbers right, correct? They object to four. Sixteen forms of birth control, Hobby Lobby is fine with his insurance company providing that to the female workers?
RIENZI: That’s right. And Hobby Lobby is a company that does a wonderful job taking care of its employees. It pays them starting salaries roughly twice the minimum wage. It provides excellent health benefits. There’s just a small sliver of things that this family cannot do. And the governments view, is that Hobby Lobby should be crushed with fines or it should be forced to kick all of its employees off insurance. That’s not helpful to the women who worked at Hobby Lobby or their families or anybody else.
So whenever you see a liberal asserting that Hobby Lobby is not offering contraceptive services you’ll know you’re seeing either an idiot or a liar.
No one is imposing anyone’s religious beliefs on anyone else. In fact, Hobby Lobby is being saved from having the beliefs of others imposed upon it. And no one is denying anyone right to contraception. Neither Hobby Lobby nor the Supreme Court has told anyone they can’t use contraceptives.
Anyone arguing otherwise is stupid or a liar or both.
And who was it that signed RFRA into law?
Bill Clinton.
Liberals enacted RFRA. RFRA is the basis for the Hobby Lobby ruling. Now liberals rail against themselves.
I am enjoying this no end.
DrJohn has been a health care professional for more than 30 years. In addition to clinical practice he has done extensive research and has published widely with over 70 original articles and abstracts in the peer-reviewed literature. DrJohn is well known in his field and has lectured on every continent except for Antarctica. He has been married to the same wonderful lady for over 30 years and has three kids- two sons, both of whom are attorneys and one daughter on her way into the field of education.
DrJohn was brought up with the concept that one can do well if one is prepared to work hard but nothing in life is guaranteed.
Except for liberals being foolish.