On Friday the United States Supreme Court issued an order enjoining enforcement of the Affordable Care Act's mandate against The Little Sisters of the Poor in Denver until the Court has an opportunity to rule on the numerous challenges to the ACA's requirement that employers provide contraceptive-related coverage that Catholic institutions find morally objectionable. Not surprisingly, in today's New York Times there is an editorial calling the decision "disappointing" and characterizing the Sisters' position as "ridiculous."

Without a trace of shame the editorial neglects to mention that the position it calls "ridiculous" was previously accepted by 18 of 19 federal courts which had considered it-- the Supreme Court now makes judicial decisions in the area unanimous in favor of that "ridiculous" position.  Nor does the Times let its readers know that the Supreme Court was unanimous in its order. Somehow an otherwise deeply-divided Court couldn't muster one dissent in the face of the Sisters' argument.  There is a "ridiculous" position here, and it isn't the one taken by the Sisters.

But it is easy to tell the editorial is simply a political piece.  It starts off without even having the decency to name the Sisters.  It refers to a "group of nuns", without a name and without even recognizing that they are a well-known order in the Church.  Of course, to name the group would give their position a legitimacy the Times wants to avoid giving them.

Nor does the Times explain to its readers what the issue really is.  The Times trivializes the situation by claiming the Sisters simply won't fill out a form-- calling the problem one of "paperwork." Of course, the real problem, as I mentioned in a blog post earlier this month, is that by filling out the form the "paperwork" rules then provide that the Sisters would lose control of decisions in their health care benefits and some third-party, which they could never direct or fire, would now decide what benefits to provide. 
I doubt that the Times would  find being forced to sign a form that gave editorial control of the paper to some third-party, under penalty of multi-million dollar fines, just "paperwork."

But the most troubling, and intellectually-dishonest, portion of the editorial comes at the end, where the Times asserts that the Sisters are interfering with the religious liberty rights of others by refusing to provide coverage for medical services the Sisters find morally offensive. We need to remember that the First Amendment exists to protect religious freedoms from government intrusion-- which is the problem the ACA and its mandates (and massive fines for non-compliance) poses.  The government simply should not be in the business of forcing religious views on anyone.

But the First Amendment does not guaranty that every individual can force his or her employer to act in a way that violates that employer's conscience. If it did, then the First Amendment could be used as a sword to force religion out of the marketplace rather than a shield to protect religion from government.

Of course, that is just what the Times wants-- religion as a purely private matter with no role in the marketplace and with protections that extend only to the right of private religious rituals. Fortunately the Times does not get to re-write the First Amendment.