Rich Lowry: The war on Hobby Lobby

  • By Rich Lowry
  • Wednesday, March 26, 2014 9:05pm
  • Opinion

Not too long ago, the Greens of Oklahoma City were law-abiding people running an arts-and-crafts chain called Hobby Lobby.

They weren’t disturbing the peace, or denying anyone his or her rights. They were minding their own business — quite successfully and in keeping with their Christian faith. The roughly 600 Hobby Lobby stores stock Christian products, close on Sundays and play Christian music.

Then one day Uncle Sam showed up to make an offer that the Greens couldn’t refuse — literally. As part of Obamacare, federal law demands that the chain cover contraceptives that the Greens consider abortifacients. The family decided it couldn’t comply with the law in good conscience, and its case is now before the Supreme Court.

Hobby Lobby went from an inoffensive business to a scofflaw and an alleged combatant in the “war on women” in no time at all — and without changing any significant employment or business practice. Thus is the transformation wrought by the coercive sweep of Obamacare, which risks doing as much damage to conscience rights as it has done to the insurance market.

Hobby Lobby is trying to fend off the federal government via the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, a law that Democrats used to support before they realized how inconvenient it would prove to the Obama-era project of running roughshod over moral traditionalists. The act says that government can’t substantially burden someone’s exercise of religion unless there’s a compelling governmental interest at stake and it’s pursued by the least restrictive means.

The contraception mandate fails on all counts, as Ed Whelan of the Ethics and Public Policy Center has demonstrated in his incisive writings on the case. The Obama administration has admitted that the mandate is a burden on religious exercise through its own regulatory actions. It exempted a small category of “religious employers” (e.g., churches) for just this reason. The Department of Health and Human Services explained that “it is appropriate” to take into account the “effect on the religious beliefs of certain religious employers if coverage of contraceptive services were required.”

It is hard to see how the government has a “compelling interest” in the mandate, when the vast majority of employers already cover contraceptives and the administration has exempted many employers with no religious objections by grandfathering their pre-mandate insurance plans.

There are certainly less restrictive means of widening access to contraception. Whelan points out that government could find another, more direct way to distribute or subsidize contraceptives, without forcing any employer to pay for contraceptives that it considers immoral.

The administration argues that the owners of a for-profit corporation have no free-exercise rights, although this runs counter to common sense and the law. Everyone recognizes that nonprofit corporations have such rights, so what makes for-profit corporations different? Besides, Congress went out of its way to define the ambit of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act to include “any exercise of religion,” in order to create “a broad protection of religious exercise.”

Hobby Lobby is now bizarrely portrayed as wanting to barge into examination rooms. “Selectively denying insurance coverage for contraceptive methods an employer considers sinful,” the liberal legal lion Walter Dellinger wrote in The Washington Post, “makes the employer a party to a woman’s medical consultations.” And here the Greens thought they were just selling glue, scrapbook paper, beads and the like.

The truth is that the Obama administration wants to bring Hobby Lobby to heel as a matter of principle. In its pinched view of religion, faith should be limited as much as possible to the pews. In its attenuated regard for civil society, it believes government should overawe any person, business, or institution whose beliefs run counter to officially sanctioned attitudes.

Make no mistake, the culture war is alive and well, and the aggressor isn’t Hobby Lobby. The Greens will be happy to go back to minding their own business — if the federal government sees fit to permit them.

Rich Lowry can be reached via e-mail: comments.lowry@nationalreview.com.

More in Opinion

A silver salmon is weighed at Three Bears in Kenai, Alaska. Evelyn McCoy, customer service PIC at Three Bears, looks on. (Photo by Jeff Helminiak/Peninsula Clarion)
Opinion: Will coho salmon be the next to disappear in the Kenai River?

Did we not learn anything from the disappearance of the kings from the Kenai River?

Jonathan Flora is a lifelong commercial fisherman and dockworker from Homer, Alaska.
Point of View: Not fishing for favors — Alaskans need basic health care access

We ask our elected officials to oppose this bill that puts our health and livelihoods in danger.

Alex Koplin. (courtesy photo)
Opinion: Public schools do much more than just teach the three Rs

Isn’t it worth spending the money to provide a quality education for each student that enters our schools?

Gov. Mike Dunleavy speaks to reporters at the Alaska State Capitol on Thursday, April 17, 2025. (Jasz Garrett / Juneau Empire file photo)
Letter to the Editor: Law enforcement officers helped ensure smooth, secure energy conference

Their visible commitment to public safety allowed attendees to focus fully on collaboration, learning, and the important conversations shaping our path forward.

Laurie Craig / Juneau Empire file photo
The present-day KTOO public broadcasting building, built in 1959 for the U.S. Army’s Alaska Communications System Signal Corps, is located on filled tidelands near Juneau’s subport. Today vehicles on Egan Drive pass by the concrete structure with satellite dishes on the roof that receive signals from NPR, PBS and other sources.
My Turn: Stand for the community radio, not culture war optics

Alaskans are different and we pride ourselves on that. If my vehicle… Continue reading

U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) delivers his annual speech to the Alaska Legislature on Thursday, March 20, 2025. (Jasz Garrett / Juneau Empire file photo)
Opinion: Sullivan, Trump and the rule of lawlessness

In September 2023, U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan established his own Alaska Federal… Continue reading

UAA Provost Denise Runge photographed outside the Administration and Humanities Building at the University of Alaskas Anchorage. (courtesy photo)
Opinion: UAA’s College of Health — Empowering Alaska’s future, one nurse at a time

At the University of Alaska Anchorage, we understand the health of our… Continue reading

U.S. Rep. Nick Begich III, R-Alaska, address a joint session of the Alaska Legislature on Thursday, Feb. 20, 2025. (Mark Sabbatini / Juneau Empire file photo)
Opinion: A noncongressman for Alaska?

It’s right to ask whether Nick Begich is a noncongressman for Alaska.… Continue reading

Boats return to the Homer Harbor at the end of the fishing period for the 30th annual Winter King Salmon Tournament on Saturday, March 23, 2024 in Homer, Alaska. (Delcenia Cosman/Homer News)
Opinion: Funding sustainable fisheries

Spring is always a busy season for Alaska’s fishermen and fishing communities.… Continue reading

Gov. Mike Dunleavy holds a press conference on Monday, May 19, 2025, to discuss his decision to veto an education bill. (Jasz Garrett / Juneau Empire file photo)
Opinion: On fiscal policy, Dunleavy is a governor in name only

His fiscal credibility is so close to zero that lawmakers have no reason to take him seriously.

Sen. Jesse Bjorkman, R-Nikiski, speaks in support overriding Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s veto of House Bill 69 at the Alaska Capitol in Juneau, Alaska, on Tuesday, April 22, 2025. (Mark Sabbatini/Juneau Empire)
Capitol Corner: Finishing a session that will make a lasting impact

Sen. Jesse Bjorkman reports back from Juneau.