The Health and Human Services (HHS) mandate requiring all employers to to provide abortifacients, sterilization, and contraceptives to female employees
as “preventative care,” sparked an uproar of criticism. The Obama administration, in response, proposed a potential compromise that would allow religious institutions to be, at least in part, exempt from the mandate, but another administration announcement on the topic has resulted in similar disapproval.
According to The Hill’s, “Healthwatch“, the Obama administration will require colleges and universities to treat students as “employees,” providing them with contraception without copay. It also claimed there will be a religious exemption.
Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards came out in support of the mandate stating,
“Covering birth control with no co-pays means college students will not have to choose between paying for tuition and books, or paying for basic health care like birth control.”
First of all, if students are deciding between whether to buy books or birth control…I’d argue priorities may be the bigger issue at hand.
But most importantly, as stated by many policy and political figures since the original contraception mandate, the issue with these requirements has nothing to do with contraception – the issue is the requirement itself. In what realm of authority should the federal government be able to force institutions of higher education to provide anything besides the best education possible?
Bottomline: If a university or college wants to provide birth control to its students without a copay, let that be their choice! But mandating it is coercive and a complete overreach of federal authority.
As stated by legal scholar Anna Franzonello,
”Consider that the line of cases from Griswold to Roe, cases that deal with contraception and abortion – none of them say that there is a right to payment for these drugs, devices, and procedures. The Obama administration has twisted this from an issue of your right to privacy to their claim they can demand participation from everyone else.”
Again the Obama administration is demonstarting how, not only in this mandate but in a majority of its policies, it unprecedently attacks liberty and freedom in order to fulfil it’s own political agenda.
