Americans largely support the Supreme Court’s ruling on Hobby Lobby and feel the outcome will not affect where they seek employment, a Rasmussen Reports poll found.
Forty-nine percent (49%) believe a business should be allowed to opt out of providing coverage for contraceptives if providing such health insurance coverage violates the religious beliefs of the business’ owner. Thirty-nine percent (39%) disagree, while 12% more are undecided.
The White House suggested that by refusing to offer contraceptive coverage to employees, business owners will be endangering women’s health; however, the poll suggests that this isn’t a major concern for most workers.
Just 38% of voters say it is at least somewhat important to their decision where to work whether a company pays for all contraceptive coverage. Fifty-eight percent (58%) say it’s not important.
Additionally, individuals are increasingly seeing the federal government as a threat rather than a protector of religious rights. Almost 50 percent of those polled view the government as a First Amendment hazard, up by seven percentage points since last year.
The Supreme Court acknowledged the Obama administration’s inflexible stance on the mandate in its ruling, stating that the government failed to pass the “least-restrictive-means” test of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act:
“HHS has not shown that it lacks other means of achieving its desired goal without imposing a substantial burden on the exercise of religion. The Government could, e.g., assume the cost of providing the four contraceptives to women unable to obtain coverage due to their employers’ religious objections. Or it could extend the accommodation that HHS has already established for religious nonprofit organizations to non-profit employers with religious objections to the contraceptive mandate.”
These alternative options could have achieved the same outcome without trampling on the First Amendment. Somehow, these options did not make their way into the nearly 1,000 page law.
Funny—maybe they ran out of space?