Title: Obamacare v. the First Amendment | TheHill
Headings: Obamacare v. the First Amendment
Obamacare v. the First Amendment
Content: The circumstances are similar in the case of Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp v. Sebelius, which will be argued in tandem with the Hobby Lobby case. Oddly, the administration has allowed religious institutions to be exempt from certain Obamacare provisions that violate their First Amendment rights but fails to recognize that individuals and companies can share the same convictions as exempt religious organizations. Detractors falsely portray the cases in terms of birth control or zealotry but the true question is whether the protections of the First Amendment extend to companies. The five fundamental rights of the First Amendment - religion, speech, the press, peaceful assembly and the right to petition the government for redress - represent the core of the American founding. The problem is that some want to cherry pick which provisions will be held sacrosanct and which will be disregarded. We can’t do that; the First Amendment is a package deal. The news media, for example, would be hypocritical in defending freedom of the press while not defending, with equal vigor, freedom of speech, religion or any other aspect of the amendment. There were parallel constitutional principles underlying the recent decision on whether Tea Party Patriots is entitled to freedom of speech as a recognized 501 (c) (3) and (c) (4) organization by the Internal Revenue Service. We ultimately prevailed without intervention by the Supreme Court, but have an innate appreciation for the First Amendment like that held by others who struggled for years in pursuit of free speech.