{"id":320,"date":"2014-03-29T21:14:34","date_gmt":"2014-03-30T01:14:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www3.law.harvard.edu\/journals\/hlpr\/?p=320"},"modified":"2015-10-02T15:21:33","modified_gmt":"2015-10-02T15:21:33","slug":"corporations-right-to-exercise-religion-in-hobby-lobby","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/2014\/03\/29\/corporations-right-to-exercise-religion-in-hobby-lobby\/","title":{"rendered":"Corporations\u2019 Right to Exercise Religion in Hobby Lobby"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>By Ana Choi<\/em><\/p>\n<p>On Tuesday, March 25, the Supreme Court heard the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.supremecourt.gov\/oral_arguments\/argument_transcripts\/13-354_5436.pdf\">oral arguments<\/a> for the combined cases of <i>Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby Stores<\/i> and <i>Conestoga Wood Specialties v. Sebelius<\/i>. The two cases deal with the following question: can a for-profit corporation claim a religious freedom exception from the contraceptive mandate of the Affordable Care Act? On the one hand there is the government\u2019s interest in making birth control available to all classes of women, and on the other hand there is the corporation owners\u2019 interest in setting corporate policies that accord with their personal religious beliefs.<\/p>\n<p>The challengers rely on the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.law.cornell.edu\/uscode\/text\/42\/2000bb-1\">Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993<\/a>, which declares that \u201cGovernment shall not substantially burden a <b>person\u2019s<\/b> exercise of religion\u201d unless the burden is \u201cthe least restrictive means\u201d of furthering a \u201ccompelling government interest.\u201d The problem, however, is that it is unclear whether a corporation can be a \u201cperson\u201d with the right to exercise religion. During the oral arguments, Justice Sotomayor asked, \u201cWe have, according to our jurisprudence, 200 years of corporations speaking in its own interests. But where are the cases that show that a corporation exercises religion?\u201d Justice Alito, on the other hand, was of the opinion that \u201cthere isn\u2019t anything inherent in participating in a for-profit activity that\u2019s inconsistent with\u2026a free exercise claim.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Regardless of which side is correct in terms of doctrine, it at least seems clear that recognizing a corporation\u2019s right to exercise religion could lead to problematic results. In his <a href=\"http:\/\/sblog.s3.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/89\/2014\/03\/13-354rbUnitedStates1.pdf\">brief<\/a>, Solicitor General Verrilli argued that such a recognition could enable businesses to cite to religious beliefs in order to avoid complying with minimum wage and hiring discrimination laws, Social Security taxes, and vaccination requirements. A <a href=\"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2014\/03\/25\/supreme-court-hobby-lobby_n_5027527.html\">Huffington Post article<\/a> suggests that recognition of the right could also \u201copen the door to more controversial laws like Arizona\u2019s recently debated \u2018religious freedom\u2019 bill, which would allow businesses to refuse to serve LGBT people.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Religious beliefs can be used to justify a wide array of behaviors, and because of their inherently subjective nature, there is no way to evaluate the \u201ccorrectness\u201d or \u201cacceptability\u201d of a religious belief. Of course, the tension between respect for religious beliefs and the need for uniform compliance with legal obligations already exists in the context of individuals. However, corporations have greater power and greater reach than individuals. Thus, if granted with the right to exercise religion, corporations also have greater potential to infringe upon the rights of others by exercising this right. In determining the question of whether corporations have the right to exercise religion, this differential effect should be taken into account.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Ana Choi On Tuesday, March 25, the Supreme Court heard the oral arguments for the combined cases of Sebelius [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":327,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center 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