Hobby Lobby Decision
- Thread starter Skarekrow
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Firstly, corporate personhood has existed long before the Citizens' United decision. Corporations have always been considered legal persons, this is what enables the corporation to sue and be sued. When the Board of a company meets, and when a General Meeting of the shareholders is called, those meetings are said to actually be the company. Part of the development of corporate law has involved the board using a company seal which functions as the signature of that person. This has been true of many international jurisdictions, such as Australia and the UK. I think the proper distinction to make is that the Citizens' United decision in America seems to grant these legal persons more rights that would have been considered the rights of a citizen, rather than the rights of a legal person. That said, I have not read the decision, so I could be wrong there.
Secondly, courts exist to interpret and uphold the law as new and existing circumstances emerge from the various cases they have to decide. As such, courts frequently do make broad, sweeping changes which affect the entire operation of the law and the social landscape, because the laws which exist do need to be interpreted in new circumstances, and the existing legal precedent needs to be reviewed to ensure that it remains correct. It is proper for legal experts to examine the laws of the executive and the legislature to ensure that they do not affront the constitution, no matter what Jefferson may have thought about it in his particular case.
Thirdly, business ethics are hardly agreed upon by the entire business community. The example of giving Dimon a raise for getting JP Morgan out of regulatory strife is a clear example - business communities are bitterly divided as to whether or not that was appropriate. I'm a lobbyist in finance, and the people I represent in Australia are consistently reviled for their lack of professional ethics, yet praised for their prudent management of our economy and the financial security of many of our clients. Nothing in that space is settled. I do a metric fuckton of research into which structures promote ethical behaviour in corporations, which professional ethics are important in which industries, how to promote transparency and professionalism, etc. and the differences in views are as wide as anything in religion.
Fourth, not all religious activity in corporations needs to violate rights. If a business owner declared tomorrow that it was in the interests of the company to demonstrate compassion for its workers, and thus offer them higher health care benefits and extra psychological services at secular/religious institutions of their choosing, and did that for religious reasons, not only would the media not report on it but nobody would cite religion as the cause. If we are determined to stop the maltreatment of workers in the workplace by their managers, then that would include unfair dismissal and bullying on the basis of race/gender/religion/ability/etc. It does not have to be about the separation of religion and state.
I think your post makes the most sense of anybody in this thread, myself included. If we say that employers are legally obliged to consider the healthcare needs of their employees, it is arguable that they are already being forced to consider things outside of the bottom line of the company. What you say is correct about where the responsibility of healthcare should go - Australian employers do not have to care one bit about the healthcare needs of their employees outside of OH&S matters, as we have universal healthcare with a private market for better care. The best plan is to decouple health care from the employer, rather than get into any complicated matters about the proper objectives of corporate entities.
But then how would they merge corporate and state power together to form a totalitarian fascist dictatorship?
The corporations must take control of more aspects of peoples lives and the government must become bigger and more intrusive for the fascist state to flourish
That way the super rich can rule unchallenged and individual rights can become a quaint memory....game, set and match to the el-iite
I understand that that idea of “corporate personhood” has been around for over a hundred years…but the difference is that they weren’t recognized and given the same rights that each man and woman are given under the US Constitution. Citizen’s United changed that by saying that money was equal to free speech…which basically sold out our democracy to the highest bidder, not the way it was intended to be. The McCutcheon decision took that even further and stripped away the caps on election contraptions, further selling us out. This most recent decision once again took the idea that corporations are “people” and give them religious rights…the only problem with that is that those rights now supersede the rights of those working for them…the actual people.
I know you probably don’t fully get how our system here works since you are in Australia….but, the Supreme Court is not the ones who are to make or retract laws…yes, they can interpret them…but not change them - in this case though, they changed the law by nullifying it.
It is set up this way for several reasons…they are not elected by the people, they are chosen by the President and passed by Congress. And secondly, they have no term limits nor can they be removed from the bench until they either resign or die. That is why they aren’t supposed to pass or retract laws…because no matter how many people may disagree with them, we cannot elect someone else. That is not a democracy, that would make it a monarchy. Hell, even the monarchies of today don’t pass laws.
This law does not provide more religious freedom for anyone but corporations…it is an interpretation of the RFRA (Religious Freedom Restoration Act) which basically says there cannot be any laws that substantially burden a persons religious liberty. It was intended to protect the people from just this sort of nonsense that just passed yesterday, but since the court found that corporations have the same liberties as a human being they can hold that religion over the heads of their employees..it’s a bastardization of what was intended.
Congress hold the ultimate say over the Supreme Court…not the other way around…many people seem to have forgotten this fact…this way how Lincoln was able to emancipate the slaves even after the ruling of Dread Scott calling slave property. Because it only is supposed to apply to that ONE particular case, not a broad sweeping retraction or new law. This is how our system works here…if you don’t believe me I can cite some wikipedia articles for you. Jefferson was 100% correct in saying what he said…it was not his own interpretation, that was how the system was set up…he was angry because they overstepped their bounds.
Okay, I will agree that there are probably those in many sectors of the business world who have shady ethics…but ethics and religious values are certainly not the same…I don’t understand how you can even argue such a point. The real problem is the power given to corporations superseding the rights and personal liberties of the people on religious grounds. Yes, the Christian right is celebrating now, but it can easily bite them in the ass. I have no issue with anyone of any faith, everyone has a right to believe and practice said religion all they want…except now we cannot…now we must adhere to our employer’s religious view…that discriminates against people of other faith.
The real problem is this ruling sends the message that women’s health and people’s liberty, religious or otherwise, as both employees and individuals - are not as important as the religious liberty of a corporation.
We all know that corporation do not always make decisions based on what is good and right for it’s employees…most of the time, decisions are made based on the bottom line.
I have no problem with the owners of a corporation being religious…and certainly we could all agree that if they took the positive values of Christianity and applied it to their employees in various ways no one would complain. However, that being said…to withhold a benefit, or fire, not hire, someone because they believe a religion other than their’s does not protect religious liberty for anyone but said corporation.
It has already begun…this ruling is allowing anyone with a “religious” objection to discriminate.
This directly violates the freedom of religion guaranteed in the Constitution.
We are not allowed to believe without consequences…that is the problem.
As for the single payer system, I can only hope that we get our shit together and pass it someday.
I've only read a little about this but to be honest I can understand and support the reason for the ruling, its the tactic of a lot of illiberal liberal causes to drive people broke, either deliberately or as a by product of law suits and claims aimed at realising unreasonable and unrealistic expectations.
Its not about government action or inaction in favour of religion, its about what way the law courts are likely to be used by these other agitators, and that's not what what law courts are intended for.
I think its a shame that well meaning and intended legislation can be exploited in this way and I'm disappointed that liberals dont think about this sort of thing because it just strengthens the hand of conservatives with reasonable or critical people, often with older people, the hippies might've been the first people to recognise intergenerational conflict was a major shaper of political and social conditions but its been the conservatives who've benefited from that insight in the longer term.
Its not about government action or inaction in favour of religion, its about what way the law courts are likely to be used by these other agitators, and that's not what what law courts are intended for.
I think its a shame that well meaning and intended legislation can be exploited in this way and I'm disappointed that liberals dont think about this sort of thing because it just strengthens the hand of conservatives with reasonable or critical people, often with older people, the hippies might've been the first people to recognise intergenerational conflict was a major shaper of political and social conditions but its been the conservatives who've benefited from that insight in the longer term.
No, it was about a conservative group, a for-profit closely held corporation, pushing their religious views on their employees who wanted their birth control paid for in their medical insurance plans (which every for-profit up until this point has been doing for several decades). Because they have supposed “deeply held religious beliefs", they argued their religious rights were being trampled by the government, as the employer having to pay for a product that they say caused abortions (even though the science says the products do not). What’s more, if their values are so “deeply held” then the investments that they made into the companies that produced these products would have deeply offended them too (which it didn’t). http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickung...-products-while-claiming-religious-objection/
This will now allow corporations to discriminate on the basis of “religious objections” against anything that offends them….it has already begun against the LGBT community.
I respectfully disagree with the opinions you are stating as fact here, there has been vicious campaigning already, it has involved the LGBT community as a proxy, unfortunately for them, but it has been about aggressive secularisation.
Not everyone wants to or has to live in that sort of a world.
I understand if you want to object to “living in that world” but now they can be fired for being gay which is bullshit.
I can give you sources like the Forbes article I supplied later after work if you like…these are facts Lark.
Hobby Lobby is a conservative Christian group.
They wanted to not pay for birth control on religious grounds.
They are invested in companies who make birth control that they object to.
The religious liberty of the corporations now supersedes the liberty of it’s employees.
Those are factual things.
I dont believe that it should be the responsibility of corporations to provide for individuals birth control and family planning, I can see how that legal responsibility would be exploited by the architects of a secular order to drive corporations broke and the decisions made about this legislation will prevent that happening, which I'm fine with.
This isnt a prohibition on contraception as it has been presented by sensationalists wishing to stoke secular antipathy.
I also dont believe that there is any way what so ever that the US government is going to sanction dismissal of employees on the grounds of sexual orientation, that is just nonsensical in the extreme, although it fits the trend of using the LGBT community as the victimised underdog which needs defending, this is itself a proxy struggle for a lot of the aggressive anti-religious sentiments because there can not be that many homosexuals as a percentage of the politically involved population out there.
However there has been someone dismissed from their employment for having an opinion on LGBT politics, an opinion which isnt one of unconditional and uncritical validation, approval and promotion. It wasnt a state sanctioned action. It wasnt big brother. It was King Mob. Unfortunately illiberal liberalism doesnt worry too much about King Mob anymore and mistakes it for democracy most of the time. They need to read Barnaby Rudge.
Think about it because you seem like a fairly smart guy who does a lot of reading and tries to evaluate things in a critical fashion.
Well, here is where you haven’t experienced the wonder that is the US health care system…lol.
Most folks do rely on their health insurance being benefitted to them via their employer. A lot of people cannot afford to buy their own.
The recently passed ACA (Affordable Care Act or Obama care if you like) smoothed out some of the issues that had become problems here for a good portion of the population. Such as “pre-existing conditions” clauses, where you could not get health insurance or had to pay a ridiculous amount if you had any number of issues. Or the insurance refusing to pay for certain things like mental health services, or pregnancies, I could go on all day as to the things they would not pay for or deny payment for. I myself had trouble with this a few years ago when I was an independent contractor for Johnson and Johnson as a surgical device representative, anyhow, I had to purchase my own health insurance as they didn’t provide it (this is now changed under the ACA where if they have more than 50 employees full-time it must be benefitted), it was no problem for my then wife and son, but because I have arthritis I could either get catastrophic coverage (which only paid out in the case of a say a terrible car accident, but didn’t cover you for anything else) or nothing at all…and then for the catastrophic coverage, they wanted to charge me $900 a month, which would amount to $1300 a month when I included my wife and son…pure insanity, that was more than I paid in rent. So I went without coverage and kept my fingers crossed that I didn’t fall ill. The ACA stated what had to be covered and what didn’t have to be covered…this is why many people were upset that they had to change insurance carriers when the law took effect, because their current insurance in many cases was garbage sold to them as gold. It would not cover most of the common things that people would need health insurance for and if it did, it was only after a huge deductible paid usually around $10,000.
Hobby Lobby, has issue with the ACA requiring them to cover birth-control…and you know what, if they didn’t want to pay for it because of religious reasons I really wouldn’t care, honestly. But the Supreme Court’s decision was instead a broad sweep across the law making it possible for any corporation who has a “religious objection” to deny anything, giving them the ability to discriminate. This has already started in other sectors of our nation against the LGBT community, which just makes me really disappointed and sad. Firstly, the Supreme Court’s rulings are only supposed to apply to those bringing the case. But also it takes the religious liberties from the people and instead gives it to the corporations - that is what I have a real issue with.
Because in many cases people rely on the benefit of health care provided via their employer and now this ruling has superseded the much needed changes to the health care industry in America.
It is probably more difficult for you to imagine having free healthcare in the UK, but here, we still pay out of pocket for many, many things within the system.
Do you need an X-ray? You pay 20%, or 50%, or 75% if your insurance really sucks. The same goes for pharmaceutics, and here in the US we pay a much, much higher price than any other country in the world. For just about everything healthcare related - we pay. Unless you can afford a really great insurance plan, but most people cannot. Even visiting the Doctor you still make a co-pay…$20, $50…whatever, to someone making minimum wage, that means two nights of dinner or a full tank of gas in the car. So yes, paying for their own birth-control can absolutely be an issue (especially making what Hobby Lobby pays their employees).
So yes, in many cases it is the responsibility of the employers here in America to provide health insurance…and now this ruling has given them free reign to pick it apart on “religious” grounds.
What if the Jehovahs Witness’s don’t want to cover life saving blood products? Or the Scientologist’s who don’t want to cover psychiatric care or medication?
But because of the wording of the court…it applies beyond health care coverage…this is even brought up by the dissenting judge whom I am sure wouldn’t have made it an issue if she didn’t see the possibility of it happening - what if you had a conservative christian group who didn’t view women equal to men (as many here do) and therefore didn’t pay them equally? Or refused to hire or fired their LGBT workers? There are all kinds of broad reaching consequences.
Actually the corporate world in general didn’t want Hobby Lobby to win, because this ruling destroys the corporate “veil” if you will, which treats a corporation as a separate entity from it’s shareholders or owners and this opens them up to all sort of possible legal ramifications not brought against the corporation but the very shareholders or owners.
There is also the issue of the bias of the court itself, Chief Justice Robert’s wife is a prominent anti-abortion crusader, no one honestly thinks that she didn’t have some sway in a court that is supposed to be unbiased.
The case was also won using bunk science. In a quote from “Salon” -
I think you are a fairly intelligent guy too Lark and I will check out the book you recommended…but I cannot agree that this ruling will not cause more strife than it was intended to, nor do I think it is backlash from liberalism gone wild. I think it was brought forward by a group that used religion to exempt themselves from having to pay for IUD which are at the very least $1000 per person every 5 years.
There is a ray of sunshine perhaps peaking around the clouds…there is a possibility the insurance provider will provide the birth-control for “free” since it is cheaper than paying for the birth of a newborn…we’ll see.
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I'm not bigotted. Its not the first time someone who couldnt come up with something worthwhile to say has suggested that though.
I dont doubt that it is an expense that individuals could do without, I do think that family planning is often cheaper than unplanned pregnancies or unwanted children, I think that family planning is a great idea and I include every means in that, not just natural forms of contraception, and I'm even in favour of some kinds of programmes which are total and utter anathema to roman catholics in general such as opt out (as opposed to opt in) universal programmes of contraceptive implants (I'm in favour of eugenics, as I understand it, too though).
However, given the context of the US, I know that if legislation regarding the sponsorship of health services is not pretty fine tuned it will run into litigatious society and political law suit territory.
Everything is not happy in the garden as regards religion co-existing with secularism, and much like any other polarising issue like race, sexual orientation, sexism, it doesnt matter how much of an "enlightened", "liberal", "pragmatic" etc. version of one side or the other you are when you meet the militants of your opposite number they could give a shit and they will want to wipe you out.
Maybe they are only a small, vocal minority but they will be able to do enough to convince more apathetic or moderate others they've no choice but to rally to them.
You have a good point there…IMO I don’t believe that the majority of Christians here are so conservatively right wing as our media news headlines would have us believe, but yes, they are more vocal and those who are the more moderate majority don’t really give a shit and so “Mum" is the word.
They won’t speak up until those groups push the boundary too far, possibly tho far for them to push it back.
I hate to say I told you so….but I told you so...
SC Restaurant Owner Refuses To Serve Blacks, Cites Religious Beliefs
South Carolina, a BBQ restaurant owner claimed that he was within his rights to refuse service to blacks based on his religious beliefs. In the case brought before the Supreme Court, Maurice Bessinger stated that his religion required him to keep black people from eating in his restaurant, although he was perfectly OK with taking their money, so long as they ordered their food to-go. The attorney representing the petitioners suing Piggie Park also addressed in court the “First Amendment religious privilege claim that petitioner asserted that his religion required him” to deny service to black customers. “I’m just a fair man. I want to be known as a hard-working, Christian man that loves God and wants to further (God’s) work throughout the world as I have been doing throughout the last 25 years.” (Source)
SC Restaurant Owner Refuses To Serve Blacks, Cites Religious Beliefs
South Carolina, a BBQ restaurant owner claimed that he was within his rights to refuse service to blacks based on his religious beliefs. In the case brought before the Supreme Court, Maurice Bessinger stated that his religion required him to keep black people from eating in his restaurant, although he was perfectly OK with taking their money, so long as they ordered their food to-go. The attorney representing the petitioners suing Piggie Park also addressed in court the “First Amendment religious privilege claim that petitioner asserted that his religion required him” to deny service to black customers. “I’m just a fair man. I want to be known as a hard-working, Christian man that loves God and wants to further (God’s) work throughout the world as I have been doing throughout the last 25 years.” (Source)
There's a religion against black people?
I've read about all sorts of belief systems....i've read about sadhus that break taboos such as eating human flesh, i've read about occult orders that believe in ritual sacrifice but i have never heard of this cult that is against black people
Which bizarre cult is it that the man belongs to?
What I meant was that the mass of conservatives or liberals are generally the pragmatic sorts but it is the militants of each camps, themselves minorities, which are dangerous, they are willing to exploit any opportunity, including legislation of this kind in this instance, to try and spark the sort of total struggle of their dreams in which their own moderates, as much as the oppositions militants, will have to take part.
Not everyone wants war but that doesnt make a difference if enough people can be persuaded they dont have a choice and any offence is really defence.
Although, as I've said at the outset, I dont see this action as radical conservatism on the offensive, I still see it as the courts trying to head off a deluge of political law suits which would have been aimed at putting anyone falling short of secularisms expectations and standards in a corner.
This sounds stupid but its sorts of dirty tactics which are routine on the extremes, I've known free marketeers and commies both to send bricks to the offices of NGOs they hate, often with charitable status, with the postage under paid, knowing that they'll have to pick up the tab on the postage. Those are just simple examples of "monkey wrenching", aimed at putting people "out of business", using economic muscle to shut up opposition and disable it.
If you were, would you admit it?
This crap about liberals making shit up just to cause problems does seem pretty convenient to me. You don't seem to recognize that there may be a point to it at all, to you they're just being pointless and dramatic, which - in my opinion - is utter bullshit.
Actually…in the news today, there is a deluge of lawsuits that aim to exploit this new law…the one I posted is just one of many out there right now. The Reformation of Religion Act that was Republican sponsored and signed bi-partisanly by Clinton protected that people from be persecuted for any religious beliefs…it is only now with this decision, that the radicals are coming out of the woodwork and trying to take advantage of the opening it has given them.