Biggest US Supreme Court ruling of the year

[Death Metal]

I'm not strawmanning anything.

Except for...

The Dems are butthurt and somehow figure that SCOTUS isn't allowed to have a conflict of interest.

...that.

And yes, the judges shouldn't have conflict of interests. That's the entire fucking point of having judges that aren't elected in the first place.

[Gauthier]

I'm not strawmanning anything.

...that.

And yes, the judges shouldn't have conflict of interests. That's the entire fucking point of having judges that aren't elected in the first place.

He likes judges with conflicts of interest that are appointed for life, especially since they're right-leaning. If they were left leaning he'd be singing a different tune entirely.

[Ashmoria]

oh I don't think they would be impeached. if the bill is passed and stands up in court (I have no idea about that) then, for example, justice Thomas' wife would have to quite her job as a tea party leader--she may have already done that. either she would do that or, what *I* would do, they get a divorce and continue to live as man and wife sticking it in the eye of the opposition.

So, basically they just have to pretend like they don't have political views of their own?

yeah that's what all judges have to do and getting money from political interests--even if the money goes to the judge's spouse--is a conflict of interest that the judge has to remedy or be censured.

[Ashmoria]

oh I don't think they would be impeached. if the bill is passed and stands up in court (I have no idea about that) then, for example, justice Thomas' wife would have to quite her job as a tea party leader--she may have already done that. either she would do that or, what *I* would do, they get a divorce and continue to live as man and wife sticking it in the eye of the opposition.

And that brings me to the point. What is the point of the bill if you are just going to have to impeach them anyways? Justices hold their offices during good behavior, if it comes down to impeachment of a justice it should be easy for congress to find "bad behavior".

because you need something that breaks a rule in order to be impeached. without the rule how would a justice break it?

[Death Metal]

...that.

And yes, the judges shouldn't have conflict of interests. That's the entire fucking point of having judges that aren't elected in the first place.

He likes judges with conflicts of interest that are appointed for life, especially since they're right-leaning. If they were left leaning he'd be singing a different tune entirely.

I really don't care what side they lean on. If they have a conflict of interest they are obligated as a judge to abstain from ruling. To not punish them when they don't is basically giving them an incentive to have their opinions for sale to the highest bidder. If we don't do something to curb it we may as well be Russia Jr.

[Platypus Reborn]

It is now 4:30 am Pacific time and 7:30 am Eastern Time in the United States. In just a few hours the Supreme Court of the United States is expected to issue what many consider to be the most important ruling of 2014 for the American people.

The nine justice will decide whether or not religious freedom may be restricted in the name of women's absolute right to contraception and abortion and to force other people to pay for it.

The justices will also decide whether corporations have religious rights or whether freedom of religion applies only to individuals.

These decisions will arrive sometime after 10 am eastern time.

At issue are two companies. One whose owners are practising Christians and another company whose owners are not very religious but are claiming religious freedom just to get out having to pay for extra healthcare for their employees.

One of the companies has claimed that the morning after pill is actually an abortion pill. The pill in question, however, does not kill fetuses, but rather prevents the woman's egg from becoming fertilized. Once the sperm enters the egg, for those of you who are not aware of this, it takes up to 24 hours for it to make it through the egg to center where it has to go before fertilization can even start. The morning after pill prevents this by flushing the egg before fertilization can begin. No fertilization, no fetus, no abortion. To call it an abortion pill is therefore, misleading.

But even that will be minor compared to the question of whether corporations have a right to religious freedom objections to reasonable secular laws. The courts in the United States have never ruled on whether the first amendment religious freedom clause applies to corporations or whether that right can be used to prevent people from exercising their reasonable rights.

What do you think the court will do?

I am Christian and I think we shouldn't get bonuses, its not fair.

[Ashmoria]

Fixed for reality.

Hobby Lobby decision has absolutely nothing to do with this, nor would it be grounds for an overturning of the decision because again, ex post facto.

I'm not strawmanning anything. The Dems are butthurt and somehow figure that SCOTUS isn't allowed to have a conflict of interest.

yes but you aren't thinking it through. its not like the liberal justices don't have lives that might conflict with cases that come before the court. don't you want them to have to step aside too?

[Ashmoria]

Yes, but those rules were already in place before the offenses were made.

Huge difference.

No the rule is bad behavior.
Bad Behavior is what ever congress defines it as during an impeachment.

sure but without actual impartial bad behavior the party would be pilloried by the public.

[Gauthier]

I'm not strawmanning anything. The Dems are butthurt and somehow figure that SCOTUS isn't allowed to have a conflict of interest.

yes but you aren't thinking it through. its not like the liberal justices don't have lives that might conflict with cases that come before the court. don't you want them to have to step aside too?

He didn't throw a fit when Elena Kagan recused herself from a case. Rather selective about it.

[Viritica]

So, basically they just have to pretend like they don't have political views of their own?

yeah that's what all judges have to do and getting money from political interests--even if the money goes to the judge's spouse--is a conflict of interest that the judge has to remedy or be censured.

Let's pretend this bill passed and his wife resigned. She would still have her political views and would still be a great influence in his life. What's she supposed to do? Divorce him?

[Viritica]

yes but you aren't thinking it through. its not like the liberal justices don't have lives that might conflict with cases that come before the court. don't you want them to have to step aside too?

He didn't throw a fit when Elena Kagan recused herself from a case. Rather selective about it.

It's her decision personal decision, Gauth.

[Viritica]

I'm not strawmanning anything.

Except for...

The Dems are butthurt and somehow figure that SCOTUS isn't allowed to have a conflict of interest.

...that.

And yes, the judges shouldn't have conflict of interests. That's the entire fucking point of having judges that aren't elected in the first place.

So you don't know what a strawman is? Gotcha.

And pretending like they don't have political views of their own is silly. His wife will always be an influence in his life. Even if she resigns her position from the Tea Party.

[Gauthier]

Except for...



...that.

And yes, the judges shouldn't have conflict of interests. That's the entire fucking point of having judges that aren't elected in the first place.

So you don't know what a strawman is? Gotcha.

And pretending like they don't have political views of their own is silly. His wife will always be an influence in his life. Even if she resigns her position from the Tea Party.

So they're allowed to have their political beliefs influence their decision-making. Got it.

[Ashmoria]

yeah that's what all judges have to do and getting money from political interests--even if the money goes to the judge's spouse--is a conflict of interest that the judge has to remedy or be censured.

Let's pretend this bill passed and his wife resigned. She would still have her political views and would still be a great influence in his life. What's she supposed to do? Divorce him?

she is supposed to quit her job or her husband needs to recuse himself from tea-party-involved cases. im pretty sure she stepped down as the head of whatever group she is in but I cant be bothered to check for sure.

[Viritica]

So you don't know what a strawman is? Gotcha.

And pretending like they don't have political views of their own is silly. His wife will always be an influence in his life. Even if she resigns her position from the Tea Party.

So they're allowed to have their political beliefs influence their decision-making. Got it.

If you can find a realistic way to prevent it then be my guest.

[Viritica]

Let's pretend this bill passed and his wife resigned. She would still have her political views and would still be a great influence in his life. What's she supposed to do? Divorce him?

she is supposed to quit her job or her husband needs to recuse himself from tea-party-involved cases. im pretty sure she stepped down as the head of whatever group she is in but I cant be bothered to check for sure.

Okay. She stepped down. She's still going to hold her own views, and she's still going to be a huge influence in his life.

[Ashmoria]

she is supposed to quit her job or her husband needs to recuse himself from tea-party-involved cases. im pretty sure she stepped down as the head of whatever group she is in but I cant be bothered to check for sure.

Okay. She stepped down. She's still going to hold her own views, and she's still going to be a huge influence in his life.

yup

that's how ethics works.

[The Candy Lane]

Not paying for birth control is not denying birth control.

[New Chalcedon]

she is supposed to quit her job or her husband needs to recuse himself from tea-party-involved cases. im pretty sure she stepped down as the head of whatever group she is in but I cant be bothered to check for sure.

Okay. She stepped down. She's still going to hold her own views, and she's still going to be a huge influence in his life.

And as far as I'm concerned - as someone who absolutely despises them both - the matter ends there. Their behaviour is not, in any demonstrable fashion, unethical at that point - I'll still likely disagree with his rulings (such of them as he makes - when was the last time Thomas did anything but sign onto someone else's opinion?), but I won't consider them unethical due to Ginny Thomas' influence on him.

[New Chalcedon]

I've been reading some posts here to the effect that the corporate owners' religious freedom is infringed by restrictions levied upon the operation of the corporate entities they own.

In a word: "Poppycock".

Why so? 'Tis simple enough - besides the fact that Hobby Lobby didn't sue under the First Amendment (but rather under RFRA, which in turn required the majority to take an Orwellian reading of it to make the challenge viable), a corporate exists for the sole, singular purpose of legally separating the owners (and their personal assets) from the business in which it engages. I recommend Justice Ginsburg's dissent for a clearly-reasoned, logically laid out argument both as to why a fundamental distinction in and of itself, and as to the Court's radical departure from established jurisprudence as regards the way the First Amendment treats for-profit corporations.

I intended to quote sections of Ginsburg's dissent....but the whole damn thing was so instructive and so integrated, one point flowing seamlessly into the next, that I couldn't find a way to do so without copying almost the entirety of it. The main points Justice Ginsburg seems to make are, in no particular order:

(1) For-profit corporations' claims to religion-based exemptions from various laws have always been treated much more skeptically than non-profit corporations' claims, and that this is for a good reason (basically, that the non-profit exists for the purpose of spreading, upholding or acting on a set of beliefs which are typically characterised in moral terms, while a for-profit exists to make money first and foremost; further, that for-profit corporations are typically much more religiously diverse in their workforce than faith-based nonprofits). Specifically, Ginsburg cites numerous cases of for-profit corporations owned by religious persons seeking this exemption or that from public law on the basis of their owners' religious beliefs, and being turned away.

(2) That the RFRA, upon which Hobby Lobby's case relied, did not forbid the government from burdening the exercise of religious beliefs at all, it merely required the government to secure the "compelling public interest" in whatever way least burdened religious beliefs. Given that public access to contraceptives is a "compelling public interest" (given the many and varied other (i.e., unrelated to the idea of preventing pregnancy) uses to which contraceptive drugs are frequently put, given the public burdens caused by unplanned and unwanted pregnancies, etc. etc.), the comprehensive insurance mandate was the least-restrictive means by which the government could guarantee such access to all women.

(3) That the argument raised by the plaintiffs ("Let the government pay for it") is a furphy, if only because it opens the door to the government being required to pay for any exemption employers seek from public law "on the basis of their beliefs".

(4) That the Court, by ruling the Greens' and the Bakers' religious beliefs as "sincere" and "worthy of accommodation", has placed itself in an invidious position for future rulings, being now obliged to accept all such claims, or be seen as playing favourites between different religious practices.

(5) That in reading the RFRA as a blanket prohibition against any burdening of the exercise of religious beliefs, the Court foundationally errs in its understanding of the situation, particularly as - in Ginsburg's view - the connection between the requirement and the contravention of the Greens' religious beliefs is so attenuated as to impose a less-than-substantial burden on the Greens' exercise of their faith.

(6) That the Court, by extending corporate personhood in such a fashion, has opened the floodgates to a host of RFRA cases undermining any aspect of US law to which anyone can claim religious objections to.

Ginsburg is a brilliant writer and legal scholar; I see no holes in the reasoning of her dissent, and recommend it to anyone seeking to study US jurisprudence, given how the majority seems to delight in radically rewriting it and issuing "one day only" tickets that they explicitly prohibit future Courts from considering as precedent.

***

Not paying for birth control is not denying birth control.

Given the many and varied barriers individual women face when attempting to purchase it - particularly given the cost - and given that an employee with employer-provided healthcare coverage is typically paid less than one without (part of their remuneration being in the form of that healthcare coverage, chosen by the employer), it often is. See Ginsburg's dissent:

Women paid significantly more than men for preventive care; in fact, cost barriers operated to block many women from obtaining needed care at all.

(Emphasis mine).

Your remark reminds me of the satirical proposition that "In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets, and steal loaves of bread."

[Viritica]

Okay. She stepped down. She's still going to hold her own views, and she's still going to be a huge influence in his life.

yup

that's how ethics works.

Uh, okay?

[Viritica]

Okay. She stepped down. She's still going to hold her own views, and she's still going to be a huge influence in his life.

And as far as I'm concerned - as someone who absolutely despises them both - the matter ends there. Their behaviour is not, in any demonstrable fashion, unethical at that point - I'll still likely disagree with his rulings (such of them as he makes - when was the last time Thomas did anything but sign onto someone else's opinion?), but I won't consider them unethical due to Ginny Thomas' influence on him.

Exactly.

[New Chalcedon]

And as far as I'm concerned - as someone who absolutely despises them both - the matter ends there. Their behaviour is not, in any demonstrable fashion, unethical at that point - I'll still likely disagree with his rulings (such of them as he makes - when was the last time Thomas did anything but sign onto someone else's opinion?), but I won't consider them unethical due to Ginny Thomas' influence on him.

Exactly.

Remember - Ginny Thomas has to step down first, before I'll agree they're acting in an ethical fashion. It boils down to this: If two parties are having a dispute in court and one has strong financial ties to the judge's spouse, the judge should recuse themselves. Because the effectiveness of the judiciary is as reliant upon the perception of justice being done, as it is upon the reality of it.

For the judiciary to be effective, people must be able to trust that their rulings are, indeed, impartial.

[Geilinor]

yeah that's what all judges have to do and getting money from political interests--even if the money goes to the judge's spouse--is a conflict of interest that the judge has to remedy or be censured.

Let's pretend this bill passed and his wife resigned. She would still have her political views and would still be a great influence in his life. What's she supposed to do? Divorce him?

No, he should abstain from ruling on the case.

[Post-Keynesian Economics]

I've been reading some posts here to the effect that the corporate owners' religious freedom is infringed by restrictions levied upon the operation of the corporate entities they own.

In a word: "Poppycock".

Why so? 'Tis simple enough - besides the fact that Hobby Lobby didn't sue under the First Amendment (but rather under RFRA, which in turn required the majority to take an Orwellian reading of it to make the challenge viable), a corporate exists for the sole, singular purpose of legally separating the owners (and their personal assets) from the business in which it engages. I recommend Justice Ginsburg's dissent for a clearly-reasoned, logically laid out argument both as to why a fundamental distinction in and of itself, and as to the Court's radical departure from established jurisprudence as regards the way the First Amendment treats for-profit corporations.

I intended to quote sections of Ginsburg's dissent....but the whole damn thing was so instructive and so integrated, one point flowing seamlessly into the next, that I couldn't find a way to do so without copying almost the entirety of it. The main points Justice Ginsburg seems to make are, in no particular order:

(1) For-profit corporations' claims to religion-based exemptions from various laws have always been treated much more skeptically than non-profit corporations' claims, and that this is for a good reason (basically, that the non-profit exists for the purpose of spreading, upholding or acting on a set of beliefs which are typically characterised in moral terms, while a for-profit exists to make money first and foremost; further, that for-profit corporations are typically much more religiously diverse in their workforce than faith-based nonprofits). Specifically, Ginsburg cites numerous cases of for-profit corporations owned by religious persons seeking this exemption or that from public law on the basis of their owners' religious beliefs, and being turned away.

(2) That the RFRA, upon which Hobby Lobby's case relied, did not forbid the government from burdening the exercise of religious beliefs at all, it merely required the government to secure the "compelling public interest" in whatever way least burdened religious beliefs. Given that public access to contraceptives is a "compelling public interest" (given the many and varied other (i.e., unrelated to the idea of preventing pregnancy) uses to which contraceptive drugs are frequently put, given the public burdens caused by unplanned and unwanted pregnancies, etc. etc.), the comprehensive insurance mandate was the least-restrictive means by which the government could guarantee such access to all women.

(3) That the argument raised by the plaintiffs ("Let the government pay for it") is a furphy, if only because it opens the door to the government being required to pay for any exemption employers seek from public law "on the basis of their beliefs".

(4) That the Court, by ruling the Greens' and the Bakers' religious beliefs as "sincere" and "worthy of accommodation", has placed itself in an invidious position for future rulings, being now obliged to accept all such claims, or be seen as playing favourites between different religious practices.

(5) That in reading the RFRA as a blanket prohibition against any burdening of the exercise of religious beliefs, the Court foundationally errs in its understanding of the situation, particularly as - in Ginsburg's view - the connection between the requirement and the contravention of the Greens' religious beliefs is so attenuated as to impose a less-than-substantial burden on the Greens' exercise of their faith.

(6) That the Court, by extending corporate personhood in such a fashion, has opened the floodgates to a host of RFRA cases undermining any aspect of US law to which anyone can claim religious objections to.

Ginsburg is a brilliant writer and legal scholar; I see no holes in the reasoning of her dissent, and recommend it to anyone seeking to study US jurisprudence, given how the majority seems to delight in radically rewriting it and issuing "one day only" tickets that they explicitly prohibit future Courts from considering as precedent.

***

Not paying for birth control is not denying birth control.

Given the many and varied barriers individual women face when attempting to purchase it - particularly given the cost - and given that an employee with employer-provided healthcare coverage is typically paid less than one without (part of their remuneration being in the form of that healthcare coverage, chosen by the employer), it often is. See Ginsburg's dissent:

Women paid significantly more than men for preventive care; in fact, cost barriers operated to block many women from obtaining needed care at all.

(Emphasis mine).

Your remark reminds me of the satirical proposition that "In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets, and steal loaves of bread."

Yes, corporations are a separate legal entity. Which allows them to be owned in different percentages by a multitude of different people. But they still have owners. And the company is entirely owned by a single family with a fairly consistent set of religious beliefs among them.

Don't get me wrong, Ginsburg's dissent is fantastically written and makes great legal arguments. But you know what? The majority opinion is just as well thought out, if not better. The Supreme Court is made up of smart people. And as political as they are, they do try to make decisions on a legal basis.

But back to the case, and specifically the arguments from the Notorious RBG

(1) I agree with this. You can make some distinctions between a for-profit company and a non-profit. Different bright lines. That's fine.

(2) I can think of a pretty simple way the government could provide contraception (specifically birth control pills in this case) in a way that burdens free exercise less. I do agree it presents a compelling public interest. Provide it directly through the government to the people, and pay for it through a combination of normal bond sales or even add a small tax on other contraception like condoms. Seems simple enough.

(3) Only if the exemptions goes through the two tests of the RFRA. And if it does by some chance "open the door," then yeah, that sucks. So repeal the RFRA. It's a sucky law. Don't blame the Supreme Court for reading the law.

(4) It doesn't have to play favorites. It just has to follow the two legal tests set in the RFRA.

(5) "Less-than-substantial" burden? Now who's trying to play favorites? I also don't think the Court reads the RFRA as a blanket prohibition.

(6) You're goddamn right. So let's repeal the RFRA because it is a terrible law that undermines government legitimacy.