Antiabortion Group Beats Obamacare Contraception Rule In Court

The annual March for Life at the Supreme Court in 

January. (Photo by Andrew Harnik for WAPO)

About a year ago, an antiabortion organization based in D.C. looked at a recent Supreme Court decision and pondered its options. The court had just decided that, despite the Affordable Care Act championed by President Obama, a for-profit business called Hobby Lobby did not have to offer contraceptive coverage that violated its religious beliefs.

Covington Catholic High School freshman Tommy Smith 

of Cincinnati confronts an abortion rights protester 

at a march. (Photo by Andrew Harnik for WAPO)

March for Life — a group that, among other activities, holds a rally in D.C. each year — objected to the contraceptive mandate too, but not on religious grounds like Hobby Lobby. So would it still have to provide contraception that it thought was immoral?

The group filed a lawsuit against the Department of Health and Human Services to find out.

“It’s a case that is a little bit unique among the other cases,” Matt Bowman, senior legal counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), who represented March for Life, said at the time. “March for Life is not a religious organization. Their pro-life beliefs are based on science and ethics, but not faith.”

Now, a U.S. District Court has ruled that, like some like-minded religious groups, March for Life does not have to offer coverage for a service it doesn’t believe in.

Judge Richard Leon

“March for Life has been excised from the fold because it is not ‘religious,'” Judge Richard J. Leon of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia wrote in his opinion. “This is nothing short of regulatory favoritism.”

He said the government had violated March for Life’s rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fifth Amendment, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the Administrative Procedure Act, which sets procedural standards for federal regulatory agencies.

Read the rest of the story HERE.

If you like what you see, please "Like" us on Facebook either here or here. Please follow us on Twitter here.