Obamacare going back to court

Mr. Deez

Mr. Deez

Beer Prophet
Hobby Lobby claims the contraception requirement violates their freedom of religion. Link.

After Citizens United, I don't see how Hobby Lobby can lose. If your corporation has freedom of speech rights, why wouldn't it also have freedom of religion rights?

Personally, I think the whole concept of a corporation having constitutional rights is garbage. They exist only because of the government and can be eliminated by the government. They don't even have the right to exist, much less to speak or practice a religion. The people working for the corporation? That's another matter, but we're not talking about them. They've decided to set up a corporation so they won't be liable for their business' debts and obligations. You take the good with the bad on that. I'm not saying the contraceptive mandate is fair or good policy. I just don't see much basis for a corporation making a religious objection to it. (Churches are another matter.)

To those who kneejerk say Hobby Lobby should win, what happens when the company you work for gets taken over by Jehovah's Witnesses and doesn't want your health insurance to cover blood transfusions? Will you be cool with that?
 
The challenge will be that the diagnosis for what the contraception is prescribed for might not be birth control. There are multiple medical conditions that are treated with contraception.

Personally, I want Hobby Lobby to win for another reason. I do not think medical insurance should be required to be provided by an employer. it originally became a benefit that made it more attractive to recruit the best employees. It should be up to the employer if they want to offer the benefits.

Your point regarding blood transfusions is spot on. I would not expect my employer to provide something that blatantly contradicts his or her religion.
 
How does a corporation have a religion? Is it the religion of the shareholders? Or is it the Board of Directors? Or is it the President?

I have never seen a corporation at services. This case is a joke (or should be) although I figure it is 50-50 Hobby Lobby wins.
 
Please understand that I know Hobby Lobby is not trying to avoid providing insurance nor will they be able avoid it if they win. If they lose, I do believe the company will close its doors as a matter of principle.

I am guessing most, if not all, corporations start out as sole proprietors or limited partnerships. As a lawyer, I am sure you know the legal formation is simply for tax and liability protections.

As a business owner, it is stupid not to offer health insurance, 401k, and other benefits IF you can afford it. The return on investment is well worth it, but some companies simply cannot afford it.

The government intrusion to force health insurance, including a minimum level of benefits, will force some companies out of business or result in substantial cuts in those other benefits like the 401k match if they offer it.

Further, regardless of how large a company becomes as a corporation and the more it loses the culture established in the beginning, the more it loses it's initial purpose. I believe this is the core reason many companies eventually fail. I know this is a leap for most people to believe and is purely my own personal belief. I expect nobody else to buy my opinion as truth.
 
My legal opinion is that a corporation does not have a religion (as a legal fiction it also should not have first amendment rights but this is a subject for a different thread). A corporation is created by virtue of state law and but for these laws would not exist. By virtue of the supremacy clause of the US Constitution, any state law entity is also subject to federal law. The ACA is a federal law.

The First Amendment to the US Constitution is a two way street. It allows individuals the freedom to practice any religion they want (with very few exceptions). It also does not permit the government to establish a religion. Modifying the ACA to suit the wants of the corporate owners (I guess this is who gets to decide the religion of a corporation) is a joke because a corporation does not and cannot have a religion and it is allowing someone to dictate religious beliefs to the individual employees in violation of their potential rights and modifying a government program and law dictating minimum coverage in violation of the First Amendment.

Could Hobby Lobby or any corporation decline to pay some or all of the Medicare or Medicaid component of wages because of what it covers?

This case is ludicrous. It is ludicrous because a corporation does not really exist. It is a legal fiction. It is not a person. As Deez mentions, this is a more interesting case if it is a sole proprietorship. I still think they lose as long as it is a for profit non-religious entity, but that is another thread too.

And what about the religious or personal rights of the employees? Do you have to become a Muslim or Sikh or whatever to work for a corporation? Do corporations get to dictate where and how you live your life? Where does this end?

The biggest joke of all in this is that anyone could think Hobby Lobby (or whomever) would or could decide whether health insurance for individuals covers birth control. It is up (or damn well should be in a rational and "free" society) to the individual person not their employer whether they want to utilize this. Period.

Why does a corporate employer have more or better rights than the individual employee? This to me is the most offensive part of the entire analysis and why I consider the case to be a joke.

So this case is a joke and a reflection of an activist federal judiciary. You got any legal analysis?
 
Unless they are willing to sign up as a religious organization, I don't see where this has any chance to withstand an appellate reversal.
 
A corporation has a separate legal existence from its constituents or owners. It is not a conglomeration. The law treats it as a stand alone entity. It does not and cannot have a religion. It does not have a belief and it does not attend church. There are no special rights (or should not be) beyond what the state and federal government permit.

You want to elevate the "rights" of an individual shareholder or corporate officer above the rights of the individual employees. As an employee who earns the right to health insurance, it is my right to choose whether to receive free contraceptives. For my employer to force me to pay for them infringes on my rights.

And where does this end? Do corporations decide they don't have to pay for Medicaid, Medicare, or Social Security because certain parts are against their "religion"?

Do I get to refuse to any or some income taxes because portions are spent on things that I object to?

This case is utter nonsense.

A corporation is a fiction. Its owners do not have rights any greater than its employees.
 
While a couple of things in your rant about corporations might be true, you obviously do not understand what a corporation is. And much to your dismay, owners do have rights granted by the legal agreement employees do not have.
 
That's considered a response?

I know exactly what a corporation is and is not legally.

How about you dazzle me with your legal analysis of this issue? Can Texas or (heaven forbid) Delaware ban corporations or limit their existence? Why or why not?
 
"A corporation is a fiction. Its owners do not have rights any greater than its employees. "

Obviously you don't.
 
You have very poor reading comprehension and are not following the thread. This thread is about (and my posts have all concerned) constitutional rights specifically the free exercise clause of the first amendment. The owners of a corporation (or shareholders or board or officers) do not have rights (can you guess what type of rights I am describing or should I draw it in crayon for you?) superior to those of the employees.

Now are you going to answer my question?

laugh.gif
 
Shareholders set and guide the direction of the corporation through their voting rights and election/appointment of corporate leadership. If shareholders want a company to act in a certain way or adopt a certain culture, they have the right to do so via their votes as long as it is not a violation of law. If shareholders vote to follow certain beliefs, it is their right to do so.

Employees do not possess this right. You asked several stupid questions in your rant. I was simply pointing out the obvious error you made in your argument. Don't worry, liberals make these mistakes all of the time.
 
You have yet to make an intelligent statement on this thread. You have shown zero grasp of the law or more specifically constitutional law. Do you have any understanding of these issues at all or am I just wasting my time?

Corporations and corporate owners have no right to dictate how employees behave or believe when imposed on the employees by reducing governmentally set minimum standards.

Can a corporation have a religious belief that children should work and then hire children in violation of child labor laws? Why or why not?

The ACA sets a minimal federal coverage floor for insurance. The corporation (or its control group) is seeking to alter this because of their beliefs. The individual employees beliefs are impinged when they want contraceptives but are forced to pay for them. You have never explained (and indeed cannot) why an employer gets to tell an employee that this government imposed benefit is not afforded them.

Thanks for the laughs. You also failed to answer my original question which is par for the course on this Faux News echo chamber of a forum.
 
I simply pointed out the lie you told about rights of employees. Even though your President can lie to the American people to get his way, you will be called out on at least this message board when you lie.

I know you want the government to take care of you while some of us can do so for ourselves. It is the difference between liberals and conservatives. Tune back into MSNBC and find out what you and roger35 should be misleading the masses about tomorrow.
 
It's interesting, but I'm not surprised at the employer mandate issue. If the individual mandate is deemed constitutional, it would be very strange to strike down the employer mandate.

The decision not to grant cert on the contraception issue is remarkable and might actually bode well for Hobby Lobby. As a non-profit religious institution, I assume that Liberty has a stronger case than Hobby Lobby does. If the Court is planning to broadly confer religious rights on corporate entities, it makes more sense to do it in the Hobby Lobby case, because it's much broader and answers the question for both for-profit groups and non-profit groups. Obviously, you wouldn't give religious rights to Hobby Lobby that you wouldn't give to Liberty. If they were planning to affirm the contraceptive mandate, it would have made more sense to take up the Liberty case than the Hobby Lobby case.

Of course, all of this is speculation because the post-Citizens United world is a new legal paradigm and a new judicial activism on the Right that isn't guided by traditional legal principles. Frankly, I don't see a rational argument why a corporation could have free speech rights but not religious rights, as stupid as that is.

To quote from Aladdin (as Justice Dale Wainwright did in In re McAllen Medical Center, where the Texas Supreme Court destroyed decades of mandamus case law to entrench the insurance industry's balls an inch further into its throat, not that anyone gives a damn about that.)

A whole new world
A new fantastic point of view
No one to tell us no
Or where to go
Or say we’re only dreaming
 
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