Does the fact that Barack Obama won the Catholic vote nationwide (albeit narrowly) weaken the position of Catholic bishops that the contraception mandate within Obamacare represents a violation of their members’ religious freedom? Mark Movsesian, director of the Center for Law and Religion at St. John’s University, writes:
One should remember…that the Obama Administration imposed the contraception mandate, and … Catholic bishops made the mandate a salient issue. Requiring Catholic institutions to provide contraceptives and abortifacients to employees, the bishops said, seriously threatens Catholics’ religious freedom. …
Leaving aside whether voters who disregard their bishops’ views on the contraception mandate are erring as Catholics–a question on which I’m not qualified to state an opinion–I wonder what implications this vote has for the future of the mandate. Legally, the lawsuits under RFRA (Religious Freedom Restoration Act) will go forward, and I think they have a fair shot at success. But the atmosphere may have changed. It won’t show up expressly in judicial opinions, of course, but I wonder whether judges who support the mandate won’t feel more emboldened to find that the mandate doesn’t “substantially burden” Catholic institutions. And I wonder whether the Obama Administration won’t feel more comfortable taking a hard line on whatever “accommodation” they are preparing for the final regulations, due before August 2013. The courts may or may not follow the election returns, but politicians surely do.