Obama Administration Proposes New Rules on Contraception

The Obama administration has presented a new attempt to deal with religious objections to insurance coverage for contraception, but its effect on Wheaton College’s federal lawsuit remains unclear.

The federal Department of Health and Human Services announced plans on Feb. 1 to change the way that nonprofit religious institutions, including hospitals and universities, will be required to insure contraceptives that employers oppose for religious reasons.

“The administration obviously realizes that the HHS mandate puts constitutional rights at risk,” said Kyle Duncan, General Counsel for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, in a press release dated Feb. 1. “There would have been an easy way to resolve this — expanding the exemption — but the proposed rule expressly rejects that option.”

Wheaton’s director of media relations, LaTonya Taylor, said the school is still reviewing the government’s proposal and considering its implications.

Under the proposed rules, religious nonprofits that oppose certain kinds of contraception, such as the “morning-after pill,” will be able to exclude them from their student and employee health insurance plans. Employees and students at those institutions would still have access to all contraceptives through a separate insurance plan that would cover the objectionable pills and services at no cost.

Churches and other houses of worship remain exempt from the mandate, but the government has clarified the criteria for exemption, reverting to the Internal Revenue Service’s definition of a house of worship.

For-profit companies such as Hobby Lobby and Bible publisher Tyndale House and secular pro-life organizations will still have to cover contraceptives in their insurance plans regardless of the owners and directors’ beliefs.

According to Stanley Carlson-Thies, president of the Institutional Religious Freedom Alliance, the new proposal creates “two classes” of religious freedom, creating a false distinction between churches and other religious institutions.

“One entity has religious freedom claims the government believes it must or ought to respect; the other entity: not so much,” Carlson-Thies said in an email.

His organization has been tracking religious objections to the contraception insurance mandate since the beginning.

Many women’s health groups applauded the proposed rules, but Wheaton College’s legal representation at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty said the plan did not adequately address religious liberty concerns.

More than 40 lawsuits have been filed against the mandate since it was announced as part of President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul. Wheaton College filed its lawsuit in July 2012, and a federal appeals court has recently been holding its lawsuit “in abeyance” while the government followed through on its promises to revise the mandate.

The government will solicit reactions and comments on the proposed rule until April 8, and the final rule would take effect for religious nonprofits in August. That is also when Wheaton College’s “safe harbor” from compliance with the mandate is set to expire.