Life Legal Defense Foundation has filed a friend of the court brief at the United States Supreme Court in the case Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby. This case involves the challenge brought by Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties to the Obama Administration’s “contraceptive” mandate. In the brief, LLDF argues the interest of the Beverly LaHaye Institute and its director, Janice Crouse. The Beverly LaHaye Institute is a think-tank and the research arm of Concerned Women for America.
“The Department of Health and Human Services seeks to force the owners of businesses such as Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties to violate their sincere religious beliefs through the provision of contraceptives, including drugs and devices known to cause early abortion,” comments Dana Cody, LLDF’s President and Executive Director. “Thankfully, we have laws that protect against this type of religious coercion. As our brief argues, the government has not met its burden of proof in showing that the HHS contraceptive mandate furthers the government’s interest in improving women’s health.”
While the government argues that its contraceptive mandate furthers its interests in promoting women’s health and gender equality, the brief points out that the evidence used to substantiate these claims is wholly inadequate as a matter of law. From the brief: “[W]hile the Government’s general interest in ‘preventive services’ for ‘women’s health and well-being’ may be valid, its act of coercing religiously objecting employers and individuals to pay for coverage for drugs that significantly increase risks to women’s health, while providing dubious health benefits, certainly fails to further that interest.”
Read the entire brief here.