Conscience Clauses

Conscience Protections

Last Friday the Obama Administration, through Health and Human Services, eliminated important conscience protection laws that provided healthcare workers with protection from employment discrimination if they chose not to dispense or prescribe for abortion drugs or contraceptives. This sudden change is a dangerous step towards outright religious discrimination in this country, and comes from an administration that fights religious viewpoints and Americans ability to express them at every turn.

I thought a lot about conscience protection clauses since hearing the news. It's a complicated piece of work, and in short I think the courts should enforce religious freedom as defined in the constitution - that government can't legislate religion.

But just to mention the complexity, think of a few examples where religious freedom is NOT protected.

The movie Sergeant York is based on a real-life man who wishes to sit out of World War I because he has read the Bible and found it to say that "killin'" is wrong. After a review of his case, he is told to fight anyway, and he goes on to be a war hero as he uses his sharp shooting skills to save his platoon. One reason that York's case is rejected, I believe, is that thousands - millions even - of other Christians have read the same Bible and still engaged in killin'.

This is a kink in conscience protection clauses. For instance, if York had been a member of a notably pacifist church like the Quakers, would his case have been accepted? His story shows the importance of courts deciding cases rather than laws legislating. If the answer to my last question was "yes," then draft-dodgers could say they had joined the Quaker church. On the other hand, if it is "no" then it opens up the door for Quakers to be drafted into armed service. A court is able to look at individual circumstances and try and judge the heart of the person who is conscientiously objecting.

In the terms of a Health Care worker, would a Protestant refusing to dispense birth control be afforded the same protections as a Catholic? I am not aware of any Protestant churches that have an official stance against birth control. The new law protects mainstream Protestants, most of whom object to abortion but not to birth control. Frankly, the legislation is a major blow to Catholics and Mormons who wish to work in the health care field, as they are the only organized religions I am aware of who have moral objections to birth control.

Another question is the extremity to which the religious views interfere with the job. A muslim who has to pray five times a day may not be able to carry out a job that requires continual alertness, such as being a policeman (remember the scene in Robin Hood where Robin Hood was being attacked while his friend prayed?) or an air traffic controller (although breaks could be scheduled with due replacements during these times) or even a surgeon (I have heard of surgeries taking hours upon hours). But when reasonable, these requests should be accomodated.

When I worked in public accounting, religion was interesting. At training we had Mormons - who cannot work Sunday and Hasidic Jews. The Jews could not work Saturdays, and could not engage in the training that was scheduled for that day. They were accomodated. Both groups - the Mormons and Jews - could not work one day a week in an industry that required 6 - 7 day weeks. I always wondered about it. They were not officially discriminated against, but in a way, they could have been. My teams always chose to work Saturday and take Sunday off. If there was only one Jew on the team, what would have happened? The Jew could have been isolated by his choice to work Sunday instead. Further, during intensely busy times, the firm would have to honor the religious person's need to have a day off, but resentment would be created among the team. Work would not get done. Deadlines may even not get met. There is no way the company could fire these people for their religious beliefs, but I also do not doubt that these traditions put a strain on both the religious people involved as well as their managers.

More hypotheticals: Let's say I was asked to audit a company that performs embryonic stem cell research. Our office actually had a client like this. I would conscientiously sit out. I don't think my firm could punish me for that. On the other hand, if I were to have interviewed with a smaller accounting firm who told me, "We do work with primarily two clients - Planned Parenthood and an embryonic stem cell research lab. The rest of our clients are small. Most people end up on one of the large clients." If I took the job and then insisted on having only the smaller clients, it would be difficult to believe I actually had a religious problem with the clients, and my client preferences would get in the way of my job.

I mention this because the protections for health care providers can be seen in a similar way. If a person works for an OBGYN and refuses to dispense birth control (provided that the OBGYN is not a private, pro-life doctor's office), this objection would get in the way of the health care worker performing his job - so much birth control is dispensed in these settings. On the other hand, it is unreasonable of the government to make everyone dispense birth control, even if the person involved works in a family practice setting or hospital, where he can reasonably carry out the rest of his duties without performing this one act.

And that becomes the heart of the matter. What the administration has done is effectively limited the Health Care field to a certain set of religious beliefs, excluding Catholics and Mormons. I already know of Catholics who aspired to be doctors, nurses, or pharmacists but were pushed back because of the connections of the health industry to abortion. Some objected to taking vaccines required to work in hospitals because the vaccines were created using research on aborted babies. Others knew that working in pharmacies would require them to dispense birth control and other abortifaceants, which went against their moral beliefs. And if these aspiring doctors make it to their rotations, even if their eventual field of study is not OBGYN, they still may be asked to work in a Women's Health Clinic or public hospital where their morals will be challenged.

And in my opinion, it goes directly against the Constitution for the Federal Government to deny an entire career field to a group of people because of their religious belief.

Another hypothetical example: A fundamentalist Christian becomes a science teacher. She does not believe in evolution and refuses to teach it. However, she is able to teach most other sciences and a large portion of biology without broaching the subject. Some may say she should not have chosen to go into science. Others may say she should not have chosen to teach. I think that she should be able to do both if they are her passions. Schools can reasonably work around this. She can just not teach it and fill in holes where relevant. She can be assigned Chemistry and Phsyics classes. She can have another teacher substitute (although everyone knows the kids will still be taught evolution). But if it goes against her beliefs to teach it, she should not have to.

In the same way, I think doctors, nurses, and pharmacists should be able to not prescribe or dispense birth control if it goes against their beliefs. They should not be fired if they refuse to prescribe it. They should not be passed over for a job if they refused to dispense it.

What a dangerous precedent to set - the Federal Government mandating which religious beliefs are valid enough to protect and which are not considered legitimate. It is my hope that Congress can overturn the ruling with stricter legislation, or perhaps that the courts will, as I know that many health workers will begin to litigate if they are fired as a result of this act. However, I fear more for the next generation - the health care workers that will not enter the field - that are already not entering the field - because of this blatant religious discrimination by the U.S. Government.

Land of the free, home of the brave. The administration should be ashamed of itself!