A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta ruled that four Catholic organizations were not “substantially burdened” by the procedure which allows religiously affiliated nonprofit organizations to opt out of the Affordable Care Act’s requirement to include contraception coverage for their employees.
While rejecting the petitioner’s appeals from lower-court rulings, the jurists delayed implementation of their decision pending a ruling by the Supreme Court on several similar cases, which have been grouped together in Zubik v. Burwell. The high court will hear oral arguments March 23.
The appeals had been filed by Alabama-based Eternal Word Television Network, the dioceses of Atlanta and Savannah, and Catholic Education of North Georgia.
Michael P. Warsaw, chairman and CEO of the TV network known as EWTN, said the organization is “extremely disappointed that the court has refused to protect our religious freedom,” and that the ruling forces it to either “violate its religious beliefs and comply” with the mandate to cover contraception benefits or “pay massive fines to the IRS.”
The court, citing previous rulings on similar claims, rejected the argument by the groups that forcing them to comply with the ACA violated their freedom of religion, and requiring them to utilize the procedural “work-around” available to religious nonprofits would impose an undue burden.
The Obama administration allows nonprofit organizations that object to providing contraception coverage in their health insurance plans to send a letter the Department of Health and Human Services, notifying the agency of their religious objections. The government will then instruct a third-party administrator to provide the coverage to the organization’s employees at no charge.
The ACA requires most employers, including religious ones, to provide coverage for birth control, sterilization and termination of pregnancies, even if the employers oppose such procedures on moral grounds. Only churches and other religious employers that fit specific criteria are exempt from the requirement.
Employers who do not qualify for the exemption have argued that even sending a letter to HHS makes them involved in providing coverage for practices they oppose.
Judge Jill Pryor, who wrote the opinion for the 11th Circuit panel, said Congress included the mandate for contraceptive coverage in the ACA “to improve women’s health and public health generally.” She added, “There is no evidence whatsoever that the mandate was enacted in an attempt to restrict religious exercise.”
In a dissent, Judge Gerald Tjoflat, the third member of the panel, said the majority was running “roughshod over the sincerely held religious objections” of the plaintiffs. The HHS work-around does impose a substantial burden on the plaintiffs, and thus violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, he argued.
Lori Windham, lead attorney on the case and senior counsel of the Washington-based Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, said the government could provide the contraceptive services through public clinics or its insurance exchanges, but instead it “wants to punish EWTN for practicing its faith.”