I just saw part of a National Press Club event on C-SPAN in which young Catholics who support contraception spoke out in favor of the Obama administration’s recent proposed rule on insurance coverage. The usual statistics were trotted out, most notably the 98 percent of sexually active Catholic women who use contraception. I am not interested in contesting these statistics — it’s old news that the vast majority of U.S. Catholics disagree with their church’s official teaching on contraception — but rather the notion that the statistics are relevant to the issue in any moral or legal way. Politically, they may indeed be relevant to the question of which partisan “side” gets a boost from the controversy (a question I am very happy to leave to the political mavens); but they are irrelevant to the issue of whether it’s right or wrong to force a particular employer to pay for a particular product. The idea behind the use of these statistics is to convince people that Catholics don’t really believe in the contraception ban, so it’s no big deal to force some of them who do believe in the ban to pay for contraception.
But this approach betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of human rights — the American understanding of which is not one of “group rights” but one of individual rights. Consider, for example, a handful of local moderate Muslims who want to build a mosque in a particular county. Let’s say, arguendo, that opponents of the mosque conduct a national poll of Muslims, in which it turns out most American Muslims don’t want a mosque built by that small group, some of them because they would rather have a more sharia-compliant, pro-Wahhabi mosque built there. Would that hypothetical national Muslim majority have a right to veto the religious free exercise of that little group of Muslims who want their own mosque? Of course not.
Similarly, think of the famous controversy in the 1940s about the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Pledge of Allegiance. What if a lot of Jehovah’s Witnesses said, “Darn it, we want to say the Pledge of Allegiance, even though the church disapproves!”? Would that make it okay for the state to force the ones who agreed with their church’s teaching to say the Pledge?
The underlying truth here is that in America, it is recognized that one does not have rights because one happens to be a member of a special-interest pressure group: Jehovah’s Witnesses, anti-contraception Catholics, pro-contraception Catholics, Muslims, etc. One has rights because he or she is a human being endowed by the Creator with those rights. How many — or how few — of one’s nominal coreligionists share a particular religious opinion is immaterial.
Rhetoric about a “war on the Church” sends the discussion in this perilous direction of group rights, and thus opens up the field for the “98-percent-of-Catholics-can’t-be-wrong” objection. (“How can it be against ‘the church’ if a vast majority of people in ‘the church’ agree with it?”) This mandate is wrong because it is an offense against the rights of particular Americans who have the same conscience rights as any other Americans. To put it quite simply: In this country, you don’t become “less than” just because the pope puts a miter on your head and a majority of your congregation disagrees with you on something.
(Disclosure: I am neither Catholic nor an opponent of contraception. If any administration tried to take contraception — not a guaranteed third-party subsidy for contraception, mind you, but contraception itself — away from individual Americans, I’d object strongly to that, because I think it would be a tyrannical overreach by an administration unmoored from the sensible principles of limited government. I would ask my fellow supporters of contraception to be equally solicitous of the rights of those who don’t want to pay for contraceptives they believe are forbidden by their faith. Fair’s fair.)
Michael, thanks for your post. No real problem with what you wrote. The problem is Obamacare itself. It's not just specific, strong religious feelings that are trampled, but our whole way of freedom. Should Viagra be funded? Do autistic kids get (nearly full time) ABA therapy? How about experimental treatments? Does Obama's granny, who doesn't have long to live, get that hip replacement? There may be a lot of difficult medical questions out there, but they are pretty much ALL the kind of questions that the federal government should have ZERO SAY in.
We need to repeal Obamacare. Get everyone out in November--holding their noses, if they have to--to vote for Santorum, Romney, or whoever the brokered convention comes up with. It's too important.
Can I get an Amen??
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe problem is that a core group of vocal republicans are hijacking this whole issue and using it as a soap box for their radical anti-abortion and anti-contraception world view (look no further than postings here at The Corner by Andrew Macarthy in the last 24 hours).
So in the middle of a global economic crisis and looming war in Iran, the republicans are seen by many independent voters to be marching off in the opposite direction under the banner of abortion/culture wars. The democrats cant believe their luck and are gleeful (go and check out dailykos and see how much they are enjoying this for example)
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOnly Leftists could be gleeful about a successful attack on the First Amendment. I've yet to read an article in NRO, or any other 'conservative' media claiming that this is about the morality or popularity of birth control. Every one of them has been about religious liberty.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseExpat you are entirely wrong. This is an issue of religious freedom and the left, typically, want to crush any dissent to their views. As such, we are going to sacrifice religious freedom, the founding principle of this country, so that women who already have health insurance can get contraception for free.
We should not compel employers to provide health insurance at all. Most employees would rather have more portability than that in their health insurance. We should not compel an insurance plan to provide contraception for free when we make those some employees pay a copay for their insulin or heart medicine which are more life saving in nature. What the left really wants is free birth control pills to be offered to all. It is a short step then to free condoms since they, in actuality, do more to protect a woman's health since they, unlike the pill, actually help prevent STDs, which of course the pill does not.
We have our individual views about the morality and benefit of contraception but this is not about forcing my views on you. In fact, the left is trying to enforce its lack of morality on us. We have both freedom of religion and separation of church and state in this county. I should be left alone without interference from you to practice it and I should definitely be left alone by the state.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI recommend you stay an expat in Asia.
But since we know that what is good for women is good everyone, why is it not a radical abortion and contraception worldview for the Left?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSomehow I don't think the administration would be searching so frantically for a way out of this mess if it were the political winner for them you suppose.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNot wanting to pay for other people's contraception and abortions is now a "radical" position.
The funny thing is, this guy calls himself a conservative.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThank you for making the author's point.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI note that you didn't even try to argue whether the position is right or wrong, you just tried to deligitimize the position with a claim that it is radical.
Isn't it interesting how some consider it "extreme" to bring Barack Obama's public votes and actions with regard to abortion into the discussion, but somehow, Obama's insistence on funding abortion with federal dollars and ensuring that aborted babies born alive are left to die is not "extreme"?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMore and more Americans seem to be adopting the attitude that anything they support, anything they need and anything they want is a right or entitlement the government must provide to them, usually at the expense of their fellow Americans. Just because 98% of Catholics use contraception doesn't mean the government should force private businesses to provide it to them for free. When did access to affordable health insurance become free healthcare services and products?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseUnfortunately we'll likely see more of this if Obamacare becomes a reality and costs of insurance rise. If insurance is going to be more expensive, why not demand more from it?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI'm pretty sure that no one is suggesting that the Catholic Church should be prevented from constructing a monumental building to symbolize its disdain of contraceptives. They are free to do so. There is no freedom of expression issue here.
Rather, the issue is whether a man with a big funny hat, and US employers who want to kiss his feet, have special rights to be exempt from US laws so that they can interfere with the sexual health needs of a woman cleaning toilets in a hospital. And they do not.
I'm not really understanding why so many contributors to NRO think there's a legal leg to stand on here. There isn't. And I'm really not getting why NRO seems so comfortable taking such a vocal and firm stance against birth control. You can keep trying to wrap religion around it, but that's all this is.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI love the way liberals assume that all laws are valid, and the only question is who will be forced to follow the laws and who won't.
The law in and of itself is invalid, so the question of who should have to follow it and who shouldn't is moot.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDo the rights of the Church trump the rights of the employee?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseEmployees have a right not to work for a church or a church-sponsored agency.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGetting free birth control is not a right.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Free" contraception isn't free. The problem is that now we are agruing using the assumption that contraception is a right. I don't need contraception so I don't want to pay for it. Wait until these bright young things have to pay for other drugs when they are 50 and they wonder why the young are getting free contraception. We have just lost this discussion. I didn't have maternity on my healthcare when I had my son. We would have paid $90 a month extra for it. We paid the doctor cash in installments. Now maternity is included in most policies. Some one is paying for it. It is not free. When the insurance companies are overloaded with "free" medicine or procedures then they will drop out and Obamacare will step in and be the only way to get insurance. This is a step by step process to take over healthcare. Don't be distracted by the religious issue. Ask first, "Why are these procedures free?" If you are over 50 you will be paying for it. It you think it is saving you money because your daughter is on the pill, it isn't. You are paying for everyone's contraception.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe Jehovah's Witness analogy doesn't fly - no one is forcing anyone to use birth control themselves, just for employers to offer insurance plans that cover it. And of course religious organizations that employee co-religionists are exempt. Same setup 20-some states have had for years without this tempest in a teapot. A better, though still imperfect, analogy would be to Quakers. While they are pacifists they cannot prevent their tax dollars from being used in war efforts, but their religious beliefs can keep them off the front line if there were ever to be another draft.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe Muslim analogy is even further from the facts of this particular case - a real parallel would have to relate to a Muslim group operating an organization in the public sphere. The fuzzy areas in this debate are about religious beliefs in the public square (like the pledge of allegiance example). What people do in their churches, synagogues and mosques is simply not part of this issue as much people are trying to blur those lines. I did enjoy, however, how the completely hypothetical and absurd example relied on most American Muslims being radical. Never miss an opportunity, I guess.
The 98% stat, which I call BS on any way, is a red herring. As Jenna points out, what does that have to do with forcing their employers to pay for it? If 98% of men use condoms, or Rogaine, or Tums, or pinot noir, should we have a law requiring their employers supply their employees with such items? Isn't that what, you know, their salaries are for?
You want a birth control pill or an IUD? Fine, who's stopping you? Payday was yesterday. Go out and get yourself fixed up.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThere's another reason that a statistic such as "98 percent of sexually active Catholic women ... use contraception" is problematic in advancing the argument in favor of the mandate.
With 98% of Catholics already using contraceptives, in what sense is it a compelling, urgent matter to "increase access" to them? After all, increasing access is the argument the administration is using, and the urgency of this matter is used to justify ignoring normal procedures for promulgating such rules.
As has been pointed out elsewhere in these pages, numerous organizations are already exempted from this and all other Obamacare rules for various secular reasons. Ultimately, this rule specifically targets only those organizations whose First Amendment rights would clearly be violated in order to solve a non-existent problem.
But once the administration "compromises," and we all slap ourselves on the back, and the liberal Catholics sit back down, we'll no longer be talking about how the government really shouldn't be imposing these kinds of rules on anybody, or how rapidly and destructively these rules will inflate "health care" costs.
Hopefully it will serve as reminder to all the Obamacare remains the central, existential issue of this election year.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse