Supreme Court sends Obamacare case back to lower court

a reply to: Sillyolme

And may you have love and joy all the days of your lives together,as well.

a reply to: dragonlover12

well ya see here is the problem, you don't see where anyone helped you pay for those bills, you paid what the insurance didn't cover... but when it comes to birth control well, all of a sudden having it covered by insurance is made out to be "we're paying for"....

when it comes to obamacare, what is being paid for is subsidies so that people can afford their insurance... what businesses are paying for is insurance for their employees. I've read some of the court docs on this case. what the religious groups want is those insurance policies not to be connected in anyway with the birth control coverage, they even suggest that the insurance companies create birth control only insurance plans just to accommodate them. but in order for them to be able to do that, many states would have to change some basic laws just to make such plans legal.

I just think it's rather petty for people to sit there and say that birth control shouldn't be part of the healthcare coverage. that if WOMEN don't want to have kids, they can keep their legs crossed. but when asked most men will respond in like manner as here, oh, but we can get our kicks without implanting our seed in you!! why there's oral sex, there's anal sex, blah, blah, blah!!! well, all I can say to the men is that if they don't want to have their fun cut short, then maybe they should be more accepting of the idea that birth control should be included in the insurance.

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: windword

Aren't their employees all nuns?

Yup, since 1839.

$70 mil a year in fines.

300 little sisters in 27 homes they run.

I wonder if they have to deal with obama's bathroom BS too?

a reply to: burgerbuddy


They don't even have to deal with the birth control mandate as this clearly shows...

In all events, then, an employer using a church plan can control whether its employees will be able to receive cost-free contraception: employees' contraceptive use will not be subsidized unless both the employer and the TPA do not object to such payments. In this respect, employers that object to such TPA payments truly are, in all practical respects, already exempt from the regulation and thus, as I've argued previously, there is nothing at stake in the RFRA claims brought by employers who use church plans, such as Little Sisters. (Indeed, it follows that the accommodation regulation cannot possibly impose a substantial burden on such employers' religious exercise, because if their employees do not receive coverage, there will be no purportedly immoral conduct in which the petitioners could possibly be complicit. See Little Sisters of the Poor Home for the Aged v. Burwell, 794 F.3d 1151, 1189 (10th Cir. 2015) ("The lack of substantial burden is especially evident when the group health plan is administered by a TPA that has made clear it will not provide contraceptive coverage . . . .").)

At this point, you might well be wondering: So what's at stake in Little Sisters and the other church plan cases? The honest answer is: nothing. Or at least, nothing will be at stake if and when Little Sisters and other such employers ensure that all of their TPAs will decline to provide payments for contraception. Ideally, what would happen in those cases is that the employers would withdraw their RFRA objections (since there'd be no risk of any payments being made to their employees), or, alternatively, that the courts would dismiss them for lack of any substantial burden (as the Tenth Circuit did). If, however, plaintiffs such as Little Sisters continue, for some inscrutable reason, to press their RFRA claims, even when there is no risk that their employees will be compensated for contraception, it would not surprise me if the government agrees to settle such cases by disclaiming any intent to impose a fine on such organizations in cases where the organization attests to the government that none of its TPAs will provide contraception payments. Indeed, that is what I understood Solicitor General Verrilli to be saying at oral argument when he answered "no" to Justice Alito's question about whether, "in that situation," Little Sisters would "still be subject to fines for failing to comply."

For these reasons, I think it is likely that the church plan cases, such as Little Sisters, will be amicably resolved in the lower courts, and will not make their way back to the Supreme Court. Those cases have, from the start, been much ado about nothing.

balkin.blogspot.com...

my guess is that those poor little sisters are just being used by shady lawyers who know that having them tied into this case will give the plaintiffs sympathetic ears...

originally posted by: burgerbuddy

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: windword

Aren't their employees all nuns?

Yup, since 1839.

$70 mil a year in fines.

All the fines have been suspended.

300 little sisters in 27 homes they run.

Do you understand that a Supreme Court Ruling will effect more than just the "Little Sisters"? It will effect 1000's of religious organization that hire people outside of their religious purview.