◼ It Doesn't Matter if You're Conservative or Liberal. You Should Believe in Religious Freedom. - Heritage
Across social media last week, some in the Twittersphere claimed family businesses fighting for a fundamental freedom want to impose their religious and moral beliefs on their employees.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The distortion is part of a fierce national argument into which the Supreme Court is about to wade. One side insists government must force all to agree with them. The other wishes simply to be left alone to pursue their own occupations in accord with their conscience.
In a reversal of commonly held stereotypes, many so-called progressives now seek government-enforced conformity. The left used to argue that we should be free to live without fear of government sanction. Today they insist everyone agree with them – or else.
President Barack Obama’s health care law includes a mandate that employers must provide coverage of drugs that can cause an early abortion – without cost to the employee. Some object on religious grounds and on March 25, two family-owned businesses – one is evangelical, the other Mennonite – will get their day before the Supreme Court.
◼ WATCH: Tough Questions on Religious Freedom, Abortion Drugs - Heritage
Two cases before the Supreme Court are not about limiting a woman’s freedom to buy birth control, as they have been widely mischaracterized, but about challenging the government’s power to force Americans to violate their religious beliefs, a Heritage Foundation analyst said in an interview with The Foundry.
Sarah Torre, a policy analyst in Heritage’s DeVos Center for Religion and Civil Society, said Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties, two businesses owned by religious families, see themselves as fighting for a fundamental freedom in the cases to be argued Tuesday.
