Posted on 01/01/2014 4:36:37 AM PST by NYer
This just in from the Associated Press,
WASHINGTON (AP) Only hours before the law was to take effect, a Supreme Court justice on Tuesday blocked implementation of part of President Barack Obama’s health care law that would have forced some religion-affiliated organizations to provide health insurance for employees that includes birth control.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s decision came after a different effort by Catholic-affiliated groups from around the nation. Those groups had rushed to the federal courts to stop Wednesday’s start of portions of the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare.
Sotomayor acted on a request from an organization of Catholic nuns in Denver, the Little Sisters of the Poor Home for the Aged. Its request for an emergency stay had been denied earlier in the day by a federal appeals court.
The government is “temporarily enjoined from enforcing against applicants the contraceptive coverage requirements imposed by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act,” Sotomayor said in the order. She gave government officials until 10 a.m. EST Friday to respond to her order.
***
Sotomayor’s decision to delay the contraceptive portion of the law was joined by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which also issued an emergency stay for Catholic-affiliated groups challenging the contraceptive provision.
The fight isn’t over, but this news is a great way to ring in the New Year, eh? How about some fireworks?!
MORE,
From USA Today,
The White House did not comment on the order Tuesday night. Sotomayor issued the order a few hours before leading the final 60-second countdown and pushing the ceremonial button to drop the New Year’s Eve ball in New York’s Times Square.
A spokeswoman for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, the lead counsel for the Little Sisters of the Poor, said the group was delighted by Sotomayor’s order. “The government has lots of ways to deliver contraceptives to people,” Emily Hardman said in a statement. “It doesn’t need to force nuns to participate.”
National Review: Preliminary Win in D.C.for Religious Freedom.
Earlier today, Archbishop Kurtz asked for exemption from HHS Mandate fines. See more at the USSCB.
MHGinTN
Birth control is free - you just have to keep your pants on!
I’m not surprised due to the 9-0 ruling regarding hiring and religious schools. What makes this mandate even worse are the fines associated with it. I am very happy that Sotomayor stepped up.
That's how it appears to me. Individual letters, that is. Not just copies of the same letter.
I believe that each Justice is assigned a particular judicial area of the U.S. to hear requests for emergency appeals.
What has happened is simply a "stay" which stops government action until the stay is lifted. The next step in the process is for Sotomayor to bring the matter to the entire Court. It probably takes agreement from a total of four of the nine Justices to continue the stay and have the matter heard by the Court. I don't know what it would take for the Court to affirm the stay while still waiting for lower court decisions.
The Supreme Court allows itself the privilege of deciding which cases they will review and which cases will stand as decided by the lower courts. Routinely there are appeals to the Supreme Court on matters which have otherwise been finally decided by the various circuit courts of appeal. I believe that the routine appeals are handled similarly; that is, four Justices of the nine must agree to "grant cert", which means that the Supreme Court will hear the case and the case will then be decided by majority vote of the nine after they hear the case.
But then I read later in the thread that one justice is designated for one part of the country, and Sotomayor happened to be theirs.
I’m not that familiar with all of this works. But I would not be surprised if the Sisters wrote to all the justices.
ha ha ha! She has a brain and will use it—counter to Obama’s wishes—She better watch out for an IRS audit or a drone strike!
Have you even read Marbury v. Madison? Yes there's crap about judicial-review, but the last third of it is solid, and [IMO] would have been better if it was just the last third, but that last third is all about the supremacy of the/a constitution over a legislature's normal acts
.
AKA using Stockholm Syndrome to your advantage.
Probably the same thing that happened when the president unilaterally decided to alter it via extensions: expediency.
“but that last third is all about the supremacy of the/a constitution over a legislature’s normal acts.”
Then to whom does one turn for questions of the law?
My favorite example is NM's constitution, which explicitly prohibits a law "abridging the right of the citizen to keep and bear arms for security and defense" (and also expressly says "No county or municipality shall regulate, in any way, the right to keep and bear arms."), yet there are municipal, county, and state court-houses which have posted signs barring weapons saying violators will be prosecuted
.
So then, under what law would the be prosecuted? If the state constitution is binding on the state/county/municipality then how can that political division require the abridgment of the citizen's right to keep and bear arms for security and defense
? Moreover, how does one challenge situations like this?
I have heard this, but seen no firm evidence of it.
No, it may simply be a choice to delay the mandate until the contradictions are resolved and a broad, blanket order that no one can contest stands.
With good reason.
This is all supposition: A) Glenn Beck has an "amazing revelation" every 3 months that will topple the regime.
B) 4Chan has an awful lot of bogus material most of which is from conspiracy nuts.
I will be leive it when I see hard eveidence
Psst! With my new method of couponing, I could buy her a years supply of birth control pills at Walgreens for FREE!
Congress—and state legislatures—have gotten lazy over the years regarding the constitutionality of legislation. After all, they figure, if something that’s not constitutional is signed into law, the SCOTUS will shoot it down sooner or later, so what’s to worry about. If the SCOTUS didn’t have the power of judicial review, legislators—and executives like Presidents and governors—would have to take their oaths to uphold the Constitution far more seriously. And considering that landmark SCOTUS decisions have done far more harm than good over the nation’s history, not having judicial review would be a net plus.
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