Legal Commentary

Last week the national conference of Catholic Bishops issued a press release summarizing the Church?s public policy goals for the new legislature.  The release reasserts the Church?s commitment to both ?the life and dignity of all? and to the support of ?vulnerable and poor persons? during the economic crisis.  Perhaps the most interesting legislative place where these goals intersect (or perhaps conflict?) is in the debate over health care reform.  As the newly Republican House took up a repeal bill last week (which passed on last Thursday), the Bishops faced a seemingly difficult question: Though they actively opposed the health care bill (on abortion grounds) when it came up for a final Senate vote last Christmas, it is clear that the bill, as passed, goes a long way to help poor people.  So which interest would win out when it came time to take a position on repeal?

 Well, perhaps not surprisingly, the Church split the difference and pressed for amendment, but not repeal:  ?Rather than joining efforts to support or oppose the repeal of the recently enacted health care law,? wrote Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, ?we will continue to devote our efforts to correcting serious moral problems in the current law, so health care reform can truly be life-affirming for all.?    The enduring issue for Catholics is whether or not insurance providers that receive federal funding can cover abortion procedures.  Apparently, the compromise brokered by Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska?which (1) requires people who want abortion coverage from a private insurer to pay for it themselves separately, and (2) prohibits the use of any federal subsidy to pay for abortions?isn?t enough.    The problem, as best I can discern it, is that separately purchased abortion coverage will still be part of a comprehensive insurance package, which does get federal subsidy.   The Bishops want any abortion coverage to be part of separate rider, so that there is no unholy commingling of funds.

 At the time, Senator Nelson trivialized this disagreement as being ?about a staple??ie, whether the abortion coverage was in the original policy or stapled to the back?but, in actuality, it is a quarrel that goes back to our earliest debates about disestablishment and religious freedom.  Here I?m thinking of the various schemes to exempt Baptists and others from taxation to support established Congregationalist churches and schools, and also of Madison?s arguments about the tyranny of forcing an individual to support (through taxation) an alien faith.  With that said, one wonders whether such formalist minutiae (principled though it may be) should stand in the way of the Church giving its full support to a bill that seems to further other very important missions.   It is at least somewhat refreshing, though, to see the Bishops add a reasoned and principled voice to the repeal movement, rather than the reactionary ?socialist operatives did it, repeal it before it destroys our way of life? that seems so prevalent.   They are to be applauded, too, for identifying a specific problem with the law, and offering an alternative?the kind of authentic political discourse that also seems lacking at present.  I can?t help but wonder, though, if this is really the appropriate place to fight the abortion battle; especially given the pressing need for health care among our most vulnerable communities.