A bright spot on the horizon for the pro-life community

by Ellen Foell, Esq.

The pro-life movement delivered a blow to the Health and Human Services birth control mandate Nov. 16, as the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia granted a preliminary injunction to prevent the Obama administration from enforcing the requirement on Tyndale House Publishers.

This is a very bright spot on an otherwise dim horizon for the pro-life community.

Challenges to HHS regulations have consistently appeared in the news, and this is the third ruling of its kind since President Barack Obama signed the bill into law March 23, 2010.

The law, in part, demands that all employers—with very limited, narrow exceptions—who offer insurance to their employees either become Obamacare-compliant, including coverage of contraception, abortifacients and elective abortions, or face severe financial penalties.

Since Tyndale House is a for-profit publishing company, it does not fall under the narrow exemption guidelines, even though its books and publications are religious in nature. Tyndale House currently provides its employees with health insurance that specifically does not cover abortifacients, including Plan B and ella.

Represented by Alliance Defending Freedom, Tyndale House successfully argued that the mandate’s enforcement would violate its rights under the First and Fifth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, as well as the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

The court agreed, ruling that enforcement of HHS regulations would substantially burden the organization’s free exercise of religion.

“Bible publishers should be free to do business according to the book that they publish,” Alliance Defending Freedom’s Matt Bowman said in a statement posted on the legal ministry’s website.

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