Law professors oppose further 'compromise' on Obamacare contraception coverage

Attempts to extend the religious liberty exemption to deny women the health insurance coverage for contraception they are due under the Affordable Care Act are fundamentally misguided, argue 170 law professors from major law schools all over the country [.pdf]. In a letter to "President Obama and the Congressional Leadership," they write:

Today, the egalitarian notion that every American deserves to enjoy religious freedom is under attack from those who would cede employees’ religious-liberty rights to corporate executives and nonprofit directors. In this cramped and one-sided view of religious freedom, supervisors are entitled to decide, based on their religious sentiments, whether their employees will be permitted to enjoy essential health benefits without the slightest concern for their religious beliefs. In particular, advocates claim that the Constitution gives all employers the right to veto their employees’ health-insurance coverage of contraception.

This view, which is espoused by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and others, is both wrong as a matter of law and profoundly undemocratic. Nothing in our nation’s history or laws permits a boss to impose his or her religious views on non-consenting employees. Indeed, this nation was founded upon the basic principle that every individual – whether company president or assistant janitor – has an equal claim to religious freedom.

...

The federal government must continue to protect the rights of women who need insurance laws so that they may make reproductive choices consistent with their individual conscience. Religious freedom must not provide a justification to deprive women of legal rights they should enjoy as employees and citizens. To the contrary, the First Amendment specifically preserves space for their religious liberty, and secures their right to act as individuals who exercise their own conscience on matters pertaining to their faith, body, and health.

Further misguided compromise is an abbreviation of individual rights, not an extension of religious liberty.

Read the entire letter here [.pdf].

[H/T: Baptist Joint Committee For Religious Liberty]