I think that’s exactly the best argument for the majority in Hobby Lobby. Once the government concedes that RFRA applies to non-profits (and maybe it had to, to cover churches, I don’t know), it is hard to then maintain that corporations can’t have religious beliefs. Ginsburg has some counter-arguments to that position in her dissent, but I do not find them especially persuasive.
But the whole point is that this is not a textual argument. The Court had to decide whether it made sense in some abstract, extra-textual sense for corporations to have religious beliefs. You simply cannot answer that question by the text alone. And Alito didn’t do so. He makes extra-textual arguments about why it makes sense to protect corporate religious belief as it is an expression of individual beliefs.
You can certainly take judicial notice of the existence of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Arlington, a corporation. I suppose that’s abstract and extra-textual, but every word in every statute must be resolved at some point by leaving the statute, and, indeed, by some kind of context. “Bay,” can mean a reddish-brown color if we’re discussing horses or a body of water or a section of a cargo building or the act of pursuing and cornering while barking or a type of window.
But there’s a clear and obvious dividing line between that kind of “context” and the kind that would discover that the Roman Catholic Diocese of Arlington, a corporation, did not have religious exercise rights…or, having conceded that, discovering that the same law nonetheless does not extend those rights to other corporations.
And immediately thereafter, you tried to pretend the majority agreed with your “misleading” conclusion that RFRA was unambiguous. For every step forward you take when pressed, you soon backslide to lying.
Nope. Occupational hazard with being right all the time.
The New York Times is publicly traded. Why did SCOTUS say this decision only applies to closely held private corporations?
Besides, I see how a corporation can have free speech rights - those rights come without any actions on the part of the entity. I don’t see how a corporation came to have religious beliefs. Did they file a document? Did they vote at a stockholders’ meeting?
As the recent line has it, I will believe that corporations are people just as soon as Texas executes one. And I will believe they have sincere religious convictions just as soon as one goes to Heaven.
Will they need lawyers when they arrive at the Pearly Gated Community? I certainly hope that both of them are available…
I don’t know – what’s the relevance of that to my question? If that bothers you, let’s talk about the Podunk News-Times, a privately-held corporation that prints a local paper for Podunk.
Um… if the corporation takes no action, how does it exercise the right to free speech? How does it determine what to say? Does it file a document about what to print on the editorial page? Does it vote at a stockholder’s meeting?
No, that’s still not correct. Taking judicial notice of the fact that churches are corporations doesn’t get you there. What gets you there is all kinds of extra-textual argument. To quote from the opinion:
Looking to the purpose of RFRA and congressional intent
Reasoning about why it makes sense to protect corporations in order to protect individuals
Reliance on the government’s concession that RFRA applies to some corporations
Arguing that it doesn’t make sense to distinguish profit from non-profit
None of that is textual. None of it is merely taking judicial notice.
That’s fine. I let you off too easy. The next time you’re “right” like this time, let’s make it a serious bet, something that will shut your whiny mouth when you lose.
Or if you still won’t shut up, I’ll be too drunk on good scotch to care.
And it’s foul ball to put the government’s concession in there as some sort of extra-textual argument. That’s not in the same ballpark as your other examples, which do indeed represent arguments beyond the text.
But so what? I don’t claim that there are no arguments beyond the text that exist. I’m saying they are not necessary to resolve the issue.
Bricker, you are always in the mood to place a bet. What do you think the odds are that by the end of the year there is at least one Hobby Lobby employee getting an abortion to end an unplanned pregnancy that could have been prevented with easier access to birth control via their insurance?
You’re again conflating the Court’s ruling, which I was wrong about; and your misleading statement that RFRA was unambiguous, which you were absolutely wrong about. The bet we made was about the Supreme Court opinion, not about whether or not you should be allowed to lie without being called on it.
I have no idea. But since Hobby Lobby doesn’t carry that insurance now, I have no idea how you’d begin to show that such a thing had happened.
And what do you imagine the relevance of this question is? Let’s say that we knew for sure it would happen. Does that knowledge somehow change the correct legal result in the case?
For the last time: when I said “the RFRA” I referred to the federal law as applied by other relevant federal law. Your initial decision to seize upon that was perfectly understandable. I have now made perfectly clear what my position really is.
sigh yourself, asshole. The misinterpretation is spelled out in Ginsburg’s dissent, which I’m not retyping for your sorry ass.
But again, this entire case relies on the assumption that Hobby Lobby is “paying for” these insurance policies, which they most emphatically are not.
They may be writing the check, but these are benefits earned by the employees themselves by virtue of their labor. But for the labor of the employee, the expense does not exist. But for the agreement between laborer and employer that the laborer will accept a portion of their earned income in the form of insurance coverage in lieu of cash, the expense does not exist. These policies are paid for entirely by the employees, not the corporation.
That this Court found that health insurance was somehow a benevolent gift religious people were showering on their employees and they should therefore have control over what’s included in them because of their (erroneous) “beliefs” is unconscionable. Especially given the fact that these so-called religious pricks don’t really give a fuck about spending their money on actual abortifacients, since they’re still doing it as of today without any government coercion whatsoever.
They perpetrated a lie upon the Court and yet you celebrate it. That’s just sick.
That wouldn’t bother me. It bothers me that SCOTUS ruled that the decision applies to closely held private corporations, and not to all corporations. So your example of a hypothetical closely held private corporation having free speech rights does nothing to address SCOTUS’ need to distinguish between closely held corporations and others.
What’s the legal definition of closely held? 35 or so? What if it’s 60? Why can’t that company suffer a religious burden and be exempt?
Well, anything the corporation publishes is protected. It doesn’t matter what opinions the newspaper holds.
I guess I agree that a corporation is allowed to have any religious beliefs, by the same first amendment, but…I’m asking how we know what the corporation’s religious beliefs are, so we can test whether those beliefs are being burdened. That assumed transfer of the small group of owners’ beliefs to the corporation is troubling to me.
That damned HIPPA ruins all of our fun doesn’t it.
Change the outcome of the case, no. But since this is a thread pitting Hobby Lobby, and not the Court decision, I decided to let fly.
I believe it does raise a question as to whether or not Hobby Lobby Inc gave any thought to what the possible consequences would be to their actions - unintended or not. Since they don’t seem to object to contraception in general, just specific forms of it, I wonder how they feel about the likelihood that their actions will lead to an increase in abortions.
Or hey, something for you and the fellas to kick around at the next K of C meeting.
This is an assertion, not an argument, and I’ve offered now several paragraphs about why the text alone is not enough. Is your argument that the only reasoning necessary was judicial notice that churches are corporations?
No it isn’t. The Supreme Court is not obligated to accept either side’s view of the law. They often reject both sides’ positions. They accept them when they agree with them.
Why can’t we simply adopt the same approach as the First Amendment – anything the company says is protected. The Podunk Journal’s editorial page publishes the content its owners want to publish. we have no trouble determining what beliefs the Roman Catholic Diocese of Arlington has: it publishes them, publicly teaches them, and spreads them as part of its mission.
What’s wrong with that rule? A corporation’s beliefs are what it says they are, what it publishes them to be.
The text alone is never enough…if by “text alone” you literally mean only the words on the page. The statute does not define the majority of words it uses. All laws require an understanding of the framework of the English language and the rules of statutory construction, and all those are “extra textual.”
But that’s not in the same ballpark as what you’re peddling.
This is an evasion. Yes, obviously even textual arguments require some outside knowledge.
But the question of whether it makes sense to say corporations have religious beliefs has nothing to do with the text of RFRA or the Dictionary Act. Your assertion that the answer to that question is in the text, or somehow available by common knowledge, is so silly that I find it hard to believe you really believe it. By it’s very nature, it isn’t a question that can be answered except by extra-textual reasoning and argument about the purposes of religious liberty and the nature of corporations, which is of course exactly what Alito did in the opinion.
Yes, often. Several times per term. Not that it matters.