The justices considered whether the Trump administration may allow employers to refuse to provide free insurance coverage for birth control on religious or moral grounds.
The Supreme Court heard arguments on Wednesday about whether the Trump administration may allow employers with religious or moral objections to deny women free birth control coverage under the Affordable Care Act.
The case returned the court to a key battle in the culture wars, one entering its second decade and one in which successive administrations have switched sides. According to government estimates, about 70,000 to 126,000 women would lose contraceptive coverage from their employers if the Trump administration prevails.
In the Obama years, the court heard two cases on whether religious groups could refuse to comply with regulations requiring contraceptive coverage. The new case presented the opposite question: Can the Trump administration allow all sorts of employers with religious or moral objections to contraception to opt out of the coverage requirement?
Even as the justices appeared deeply divided along the usual lines on Wednesday, there was broad agreement that the case, Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania, No.19-431, required the court to balance religious freedom against women’s health.
“There are very strong interests on both sides here, which is what makes the case difficult, obviously,” Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh said near the end of the argument, which lasted almost 40 minutes longer than the usual hour.
“There is religious liberty for the Little Sisters of the Poor and others,” he said, referring to an order of nuns that objects to providing insurance coverage for contraception. “There is the interest in ensuring women’s access to health care and preventive services, which is also a critical interest. So the question becomes: Who decides how to balance those interests?”
The court heard the argument by conference call. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, dialing in from a hospital in Baltimore, where she was recovering from a gallbladder procedure, said Congress had settled the matter in favor of access to contraception coverage.
“In this area of religious freedom,” she said, “the major trend is not to give everything to one side and nothing to the other side. We have had a history of accommodation, of tolerance.
