Missouri Company Wins Another Battle Against HHS Abortion Mandate

National   |   Alan Sears   |   Mar 6, 2013   |   2:37PM   |   Jefferson City, MO

The Obama administration’s notorious abortion pill mandate – which forces employers, regardless of their religious or moral convictions, to provide insurance coverage for abortion-inducing drugs, sterilization, and contraception under threat of heavy penalties – is taking on water fast, as the reality sinks in with judges across the country that the measure is a massive legal assault on religious freedom.

A Missouri-based, family-owned plumbing products manufacturer near Kansas City, Sioux Chief Manufacturing Company, is the latest company to win a court order against the mandate, bringing the total number of court rulings against the mandate to 12 compared to four in its favor. Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys and allied attorneys are representing Sioux Chief in a federal lawsuit filed last month.

The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri, Western Division, issued its injunction in the case, pending a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit with regard to one of two appeals in other lawsuits challenging the abortion pill mandate. The Obama administration did not oppose the injunction.

“The Obama administration should understand that it cannot force Americans to abandon their beliefs at the door of the workplace,” says Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Kevin Theriot. “The Constitution simply doesn’t allow the government to involve itself in religion by deciding what faith is, who the faithful are, and when and where their faith may be lived out. Confining our faith to our homes and our churches is not the job of Washington bureaucrats.”

“Americans should be free to honor God and live according to their consciences whether they are at home, church, or work,” adds lead counsel Jonathan R. Whitehead, one of nearly 2,200 allied attorneys with Alliance Defending Freedom. “The court was right to stop enforcement of this unconstitutional mandate against Sioux Chief and its owners. They, like all other family-run businesses, have the God-given freedom to live and lead their company according to the values of their faith. American entrepreneurs cannot be forced to surrender their First Amendment freedoms when they go to work.”

In addition to the Sioux Chief case, Alliance Defending Freedom staff and allied attorneys are litigating eight other lawsuits with equally profound implications for your future, that of your family, and that of a large cross-section of Evangelical, Protestant, and Catholic believers whose conscience and faith requires them to object to the mandate.

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Please be in particular prayer for these crucial cases, and for the judicial decisions that will ultimately rule on the constitutionality of this abortion pill mandate. This legislation poses an extraordinary threat to the religious freedom of all Americans, and will significantly impact the legal legacy we leave to our children and grandchildren. Pray that God will continue to give us the victory.

LifeNews Note: Alan Sears, a former federal prosecutor in the Reagan Administration, is president and CEO of the Alliance Defense Fund.