Re: Religious Objection to Minimum Wage
Then the whole of your argument is with the SCOTUS not with me.
Do we not condone, religious marriages, religious based businesses closing on Sundays, prayer allowed in the workplace, and many other things. My argument is that you are misunderstanding the constitutional relation religion has with the law. As long as the behavior is not mandated by law, nor is prohibited by law (except in those cases where they would violate another's rights and freedoms) then it is constitutional. You are using the wrong concept towards what is not constitutional with regards to religion
No one is suggesting the owners of Hobby Lobby not be able to practice what they preach. It is about imposing their subjective value of morals on others.
And what of having the subjective values of morals of others imposed upon them. HL and the Green's are not trying to impose their values upon their employees. They are not saying "you will not use these drugs or you will be fired". All they are saying is "we won't pay for drug that we feel are against our morals. Go buy them yourselves". That is not imposing their religion on anyone.
It seems like a denial and disparagement of secular and temporal, privileges and immunities, merely on the basis of the Owners privately held beliefs and subjective value of morals.
What is the employee denied? Certainly not access to the drugs in question. Those are still obtainable elsewhere. Privileges are not right and as such if I provide a privilege to another then I also can place conditions on it and remove it at any time, unless I have signed a contract that says otherwise. To legally require me to do otherwise is the denial of my rights based upon privately held beliefs and subjective value of morals.
I did nothing of the sorts. Please quot where I said anything remotely like that?
I specifically laid out my argument for secular government. I included atheism as person 3 (which includes other beliefs not just the lack of a belief, like atheism)
When a employer hires a employee they have in fact hired a member of the American public. The employer doesnt get to pick and chose what rights a member of the public has just because they are paying them money to do some work. If the employer offers benefits to their employees they offer it to all of their employees.
When the employer dictates what insurance coverage the employee is getting they are trying to tell another business what to do. Their problem should be with the insurance company. They have the ability to shop around for different insurance companies. If they all are offering what turns out to religiously taboo to the employer then tough titty. Perhaps the employer should not be in business if they cant go against their religion in such circumstances? I mean they want the world to bend to their religious beliefs, talk about forcing they want to force their employees to follow the employers beliefs exclusively or get a different job. I bet such companies dont last long with such business plans.
You are correct that one business, or individual for that matter, does not get to dictate what another business does. If I want a cake that has no purple icing on it, but there are no cake ships that offer me that option, then I am SOL. Currently, I can ship around until I find such a shop, even if it is one that does not normally offer the option but is willing to do so to get my business. You are now coming along and trying to force all the cake shops to include purple icing on all their cakes, by force of law. Through the health care laws you are removing from the insurance companies their ability to customize to the satisfaction of their customers, should the insurance company wish to do so. If there were no law that required the inclusion of these drugs, but all insurance companies refused to withhold them from any policy then all would be well because, freedom would be upheld. HL would still have their right to seek that which fits with their religious views. The right to something does not mean that someone else is required to provide it.
When an employee is hired onto a job they are in fact hired by a member of the American public. The employee doesn't get to pick and chose what rights a member of the public has just because they feel they are entitled to a specific compensation. They are indeed entitled to compensation for their time. The employer is in essence, renting their labor. The employee and the employer agree to what the compensation is. Otherwise the employee goes somewhere else or the employer does not hire them. The problem is that we've gotten the law to call what is a private business a public one and then said that because it is public it must do A, B and C. We completely ignore that this is in fact violations of the business owner's rights.