Obamacare & Religious Privilege

I don’t know what eventually happened to the curious  proposal  (via Senators Hatch and Kerry) that Obamacare should cover Christian Science prayer ‘treatments’, but it does appear that the notion of religious privilege is alive and well elsewhere in the new healthcare legislation:

Fox News has the details (a phrase that always fills me with anticipation):

Most Americans would have to prove they have insurance or face a fine under the health reform legislation that is now nearing the finish line in Congress, but at least one group won’t have to worry, on religious grounds. Democrats are planning to exempt the Amish and similar religious groups from the health insurance mandate in the final health care bill. That’s because when the Amish need medical care, they go to regular doctors and hospitals and pay in cash often with financial help from their church and neighbors. They rely on each other, not the government or insurance companies as a tenet of their faith. “The Amish believe it’s the fundamental responsibility of the church to care for the material needs of the members of the church,” said Steven Nolt, a professor at Goshen College who has written books on the Plain community of Amish.

“And so they don’t buy commercial health insurance and they don’t participate in public assistance programs.” So while most Americans would be required to sign up with insurance companies or government insurance plans, the church would serve as something of an informal insurance plan for the Amish. Law experts say that kind of exemption withstands scrutiny.

“Here the statue is going to say that people who are conscientiously opposed to paying for health insurance don’t have to do it where the conscientious objection arises from religion,” said Mark Tushnet a Harvard law professor. “And that’s perfectly constitutional.”

This would not be the first time the Amish received this type of special accommodation. Congress exempted this and other communities from Social Security and Medicare taxes since 1965 for the same religious reasons.

 

I have little doubt that all this is constitutional, but it still leaves the impression that some forms of belief are more equal than others.

Via American Thinker, where there is also speculation that this exemption could also apply to some Muslims. At least on some interpretations of Islamic law health insurance is apparently forbidden.

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7 Responses to Obamacare & Religious Privilege

  1. E. A. Blair says:

    Some animals are more equal than others.

  2. TAS says:

    I don’t really have a problem with exempting the Amish. They are basically just living the same way they have for centuries. It’s not their fault that the 20th century exponentially increased the size and scope of government.

    It’s just unfortunate that the rest of us can’t be exempted from this monstrosity.

  3. John says:

    I’m going to start up the Church of Milton Friedman. One of our beliefs is that we can’t pay into a government health care system. With a few thousand members maybe we can form our own religion. Who’s with me?

  4. Clark says:

    This seems odd to me somehow. How are they calculating the costs? Of course this points to an other problem with the current health care bill: the insane way costs are currently calculated by insurance companies isn’t really addressed.

  5. Le Mur says:

    Beside recently becoming Amish, I’m suddenly an underserved Amerindian (of the Ward Churchill tribe), so not only do I have two exemptions from the health scam, you’ll be paying me to go to medical school.

    http://thomas.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.3962:

  6. Elroy says:

    Hallelujah! I just received the holy spirit.

    John, I’m with you but can I sleep in on Sunday?

  7. Pingback: More Healthcare/Taxpayer Money Down The Drain · Secular Right

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