Hobby Lobby Forces Supreme Court To Throw Out Part Of Obamacare?

Hobby Lobby, a crafts store chain owned by conservative evangelical Oklahomans the Greens, challenged Obamacare's contraceptive mandate saying that it violates the religious freedom of the company and its owners.

The Greens, who own Hobby Lobby, argued that the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) protects them from providing morning after pill and intrauterine devices to their 13,000 employees, which is required by the Affordable Care Act.

The government argued its interest in requiring all health insurance plans in providing contraceptives to women and said that Hobby Lobby's religious beliefs do not prevent their employees' right to access care.

According to a report from the The Los Angeles Times, the Supreme Court sounded "ready" to toss a part in the Affordable Care Act which required certain religious corporations, including the likes of Hobby Lobby, to offer employees contraceptive coverage.

Conservative justices were critical of the provision forced on by Hobby Lobby, while women justices, liberals like Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, defended the law, reports the Times.

Libertarian Justice Anthony Kennedy told U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli, who defended the mandate on Hobby Lobby, that his reasoning "would permit requiring profit-making corporations to pay for abortions."

The rule at risk on the health-care overhaul is a stipulation that Obamacare requiring all new health insurance plans to pay for contraceptives. The issue at hand is whether profit corporations, in this case Hobby Lobby Inc., can refuse to provide contraceptive services to its employees.

Verrilli argument is that for-profit corporations should not have a right to religious claims that supersedes federal law. Verrilli told Chief Justice John Roberts that it the case could open the potential for for-profit corporations to bombard with claiming exemptions.

Hobby Lobby's mandate has turned into the most significant Obamacare-related case argued before the Supreme Court since the high court supported the law's individual insurance mandate in the 2012 presidential elections. A ruling is most likely to come in June.