Oct. 02--A federal appeals court will not reconsider its ruling, delivered in June, that the Affordable Care Act's contraceptive rules do not violate the religious freedom of church-based organizations in Texas.
The religious organizations, including two Catholic dioceses and the University of Dallas, had asked the full 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reject the ruling by a three-judge panel.
The court refused 11-4, issuing an opinion that did not discuss the merits of the case.
Three of the justices on the losing side, however, issued a scathing dissent that called the original ruling "ironic and tragic" for denying the free exercise of religion and placing "literally millions of dollars in fines and immortal souls on the line."
"This should have been an easy case for upholding religious liberty," said the dissent, issued Thursday and written by Justice Edith Jones and joined by Justices Edith Brown Clement and Priscilla Owen. The three are among the court's most conservative members.
In the past decade, Jones wrote, the appeals court upheld religious liberty nine times, including rulings allowing kosher food in prison, the possession of eagle feathers for Native American worship, Muslim inmates to have a beard and Santeria practitioners to slaughter four-legged animals.
"Conscience is the essence of a moral person's identity. Thomas More went to the scaffold rather than sign a little paper for the king. Liberty of conscience was the foundation for Madison's and Jefferson's and other Framers' views underlying the First Amendment's religion clauses," Jones wrote.
The law, commonly known as Obamacare, requires employers with at least 50 workers to provide health insurance that covers contraceptives unless a written form is submitted that declares their religious opposition to the coverage.
By submitting the form, religious organizations trigger a process that requires insurers to make direct payments to women who use contraceptives -- without imposing any costs or obligations on the religious organization.
Several Texas religious universities and organizations sued, arguing that forcing them to sign the form would provide employees access to contraceptives in violation of faith-based prohibitions on birth control or to forms of contraception believed to induce abortion.
The three-judge panel disagreed, ruling June 22 that signing the form does not infringe on religious practice because it does not directly provide employees with access to contraceptives.
Organizations in the cases consolidated for appeal included the Catholic Dioceses of Beaumont and Fort Worth, Catholic Charities of Southeast Texas, the University of Dallas, East Texas Baptist University, Houston Baptist University and Westminster Theological Seminary of Pennsylvania.
The Baptist schools and Westminster split off in July and asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review the ruling. The remaining organizations asked the 5th Circuit Court to rehear the case and can next appeal to the Supreme Court.
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