OKLAHOMA CITY -- OKLAHOMA CITY
(AP) — Lawyers for Hobby Lobby asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday to take
up the company's lawsuit against the federal health care law's requirement that
coverage include access to the morning-after pill.
Lawyers for the Oklahoma
City-based craft store chain and its sister company, Mardel Christian
bookstore, asked the U.S. Supreme Court to take up the case because of what
they say are conflicting decisions by other courts regarding religious freedom.
"As the federal government
embarks on an unprecedented foray into health care replete with multiple
overlapping mandates, few issues are more important than the extent to which
the government must recognize and accommodate the religious exercise of those
it regulates ... Thus, Respondents agree with the government that this Court
should grant the petition," lawyers wrote in the 51-page filing.
In July, U.S. District Judge Joe
Heaton granted Hobby Lobby Mardel Christian bookstore a temporary exemption
from a requirement that it provide insurance coverage for morning-after pills,
similar emergency birth control methods and intrauterine devices. The U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services in September filed a notice in federal
court saying it would appeal that decision.
Heaton had initially rejected
the request to block the birth-control mandate but reconsidered his decision
after the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the companies were
likely to prevail in the case. Heaton ruled in June that the company would not
be subject to fines of up to $1.3 million a day for not offering the birth
control methods.
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