Welcome back to
the Liberty Insider.
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Before the break
we were discussing
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Supreme Court
functions and of course...
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Five hundred years of...
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To promote this book.
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Protest and liberty and...
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This is not this
book, this is the book.
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The book.
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You know, this
mean public figures
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that waved the book around
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and said, after the Bible
this is the most popular...
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Well, you know, I wouldn't
say that but it's a good book.
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But... it's pun on.
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But I think anybody
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that's concerned
about religious liberty
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and how we got
it and what it means
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really should read this.
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This is a very comprehensive
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and relatively
easy to understand.
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I mean, it's easy
as you could write it
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but I mean, this
is a complex thing,
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but I think
you've woven the thread
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from Martin Luther to
the present day very well.
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Thank you.
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Liberty500.com and you
get a free subscription
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to Liberty Magazine as well.
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So we, before the break ad,
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we're talking about
the Hobby Lobby case...
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Yeah.
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And I was trying to explain
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why I thought it was an
acceptable outcome that the...
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that we protect the
religious consciences
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of individuals of
employees in the workplace,
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Seventh-day Adventists have
their Sabbaths accommodated.
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Why don't
employers or business owners
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have their
consciences protected?
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And I think the critical
question that you've raised
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and I agree with you
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that they shouldn't be protected
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at the expense of the healthcare
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of the employees.
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But in the decision
Justice Kennedy pointed out
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that the government
had an alternate place
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where they could
deliver the same healthcare.
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So the conscience could be
protected and the employees...
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So the tax payer would
pay but the employer wouldn't.
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Well, whenever you
have a religious protection,
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there is some burden on
the government somewhere.
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You know, what if someone,
what if I employee someone
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and I say that I have
a religious compunction
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against you
wearing steel toed shoes,
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you know, versus, you
know, God cares for the godly
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and all the rest and
here, depend on the Lord.
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I'm not being theoretical,
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used to be an argument
like this on life insurance
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and things like that.
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Right.
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Would that be fun?
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Well... Would you...
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'cause OSHA gets involved
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and you know,
people need safety,
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you're exposing your
employee to threat, to risk
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and it seems to me taking
away some health provisions.
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It's the same thing,
you're prepared to expose them
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in one way or
another to health deficiency.
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Well, I'm a little confused
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by the steel
toed shoes comparison.
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Is it the...
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Well, there is a, there is
a public safety issue there...
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Right, but somebody
has a religious conviction
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against wearing it.
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It might. They might.
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And so the question would
be, could that be accommodated
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in a way that still protected
the underlying interest?
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And in this instance
with the contraceptive care,
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the court said
there's another avenue
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for these people to be treated.
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'Cause they helped them.
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So there really wasn't...
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They basically
gave the exception
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and then the government will do
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what the employer
is to the employee.
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So there was no
harm to the employee.
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There was going to be
some burden or some cost
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but there's always a
cost to accommodating people.
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I really come into
from different angles,
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doesn't this come to medicine
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where the government is
playing the religious deeds.
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Oh, my...
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Well, we do both of them.
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The government shouldn't
be funding religious activity
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which this boils down to.
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Well, the government is
not funding the activity,
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the government is
removing one of its own burdens.
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There wouldn't be a cost
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if the government
wasn't imposing it.
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As our viewers
can see, they really,
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there's some little
fine distinctions to be made.
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This is why even
when the Supreme Court
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as they acted on this,
they rarely now and then
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but they rarely are unanimous
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that there's
dissenting opinions,
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so good legal mind
sometimes give an arguments...
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Sometimes may differ.
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And it may not be
the central argument
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but they may see
some complicating factors.
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Well where I do agree with
you on the Hobby Lobby case
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even though the outcome
I believe was correct here,
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it does also show
another trend of the court
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to protect more
institutional corporate interest
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at the expense
of the individual.
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I think a case which
illustrated that more fully
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or completely is a case
called the Hosanna Tabor case.
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And it involved an
elementary school teacher
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teaching at, I think it was
a Lutheran elementary school
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and she was considered by
the church to be a minister
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she had ministerial
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credentials though she
taught school children math
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and reading and spelling,
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but she also taught
one Bible class a day.
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Did she actually have
credentials, I don't know.
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She actually had missionary
ministerial credentials
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from her church.
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And she came up
with a disability claim
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under the
Federal Disability Act...
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Narcolepsy, is that right?
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And the church said,
"Oh, she's a minister
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and human resource
civil rights employment laws
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don't apply to her
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as they don't to
ministers of the gospel."
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And the court
after some analysis
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upheld what's called
the ministerial exemption
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and said it applied to her.
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Now I agree with
the court on the fact
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that there should be
a ministerial exemption
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that should
give churches freedom
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in their employment
relationship with pastors
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because pastors preach
the doctrine of the church
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and they must have
a free hand to choose
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who will represent them.
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But where I think the
court may have gone wrong
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is in applying that to an
elementary school teacher.
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By the way I
agree with you generally
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but you need to
read Nathaniel Hawthorne,
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you might not give
the ministers quite that.
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A minister can abuse his role
just as well as anyone else.
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Well, no, he can and
what's protected there
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isn't ministers
abusing other people.
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What's protected
there is the church
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choosing to hire
or fire the minister.
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Yeah.
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And again like you say
there's competing interests
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in some that overlap.
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And why I think Hosanna Tabor,
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I mean, I think it was very good
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but where I think
it might be too good
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is that it sort of leaves
the church open to charges
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that it's using this to act
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in personally
abusive ways toward people.
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Well, and I think that...
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It's got an
exemption from General...
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General Laws.
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And pastors are
generally of the status
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and credibility maybe
that's not the right word,
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but they're usually
in positions of authority
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in a church structure.
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You know, we're
talking about the Reformation,
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the big issue in
England with Henry VIII
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was which law the
minister is under,
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the church law or civil law?
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Civil law.
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But they can protect
themselves, in other words,
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largely from abuse
they're often male,
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they're the
chairmen's of the board,
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they're the
heads of the churches
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but an elementary school teacher
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I would say is in a
much weaker position
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in social status and
standing and protection.
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And I think to remove
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the protections
of the civil laws
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and the employment laws
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open up these
other church employees
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to the
possibilities of greater abuse.
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And I think it's
a trend in the court
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to protect institutions
and institutional interest...
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Yeah, there's no question.
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At the expense of
individual rights.
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And I think that's something
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that needs to be watched closely
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in the months and years to come.
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And you know, when
you talk religious liberty
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all churches and all
religions and all ill religion
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needs to be
protected at least the right
00:07:08.09\00:07:09.86
for people to hold those views.
00:07:09.89\00:07:12.29
But I do see a looming problem
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with the rise of the
Roman Catholic Church
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because it's
somewhat automatically
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looks at things corporately.
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Well, it's a return to
a medieval view of things
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where in...
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Well, it is a
medieval structure,
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you can't help much.
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Well, I'm not just talking
about the Catholic Church,
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I'm talking about
the court decisions
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that protect institutions.
00:07:31.65\00:07:33.42
There was a religious
freedom in the Middle Ages,
00:07:33.45\00:07:35.78
but it was generally
the freedom of the church
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to be free from civil
laws and civil oversight.
00:07:38.42\00:07:41.42
Well, that was
good for the church
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but it wasn't good
for the individuals
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within the church.
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In this case in Hosanna Tabor
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smacks of that direction back
to a more medieval conception.
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Yeah, you're right, I
didn't realize your objection.
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No, there's no question
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the corporate
thinkers had work there too.
00:07:54.67\00:07:57.24
So we come to,
well, the 21st century
00:07:57.27\00:08:01.04
where during the Obama years
00:08:01.08\00:08:03.18
we had the rise
of a secularist left
00:08:03.21\00:08:05.95
especially LGBT
secular sexual agenda
00:08:05.98\00:08:10.15
which came into direct conflict
with religious freedom...
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It's unfortunate.
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I don't think it needed to be,
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both parties
were somewhat guilty.
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I think that's right.
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I think Christians that
tried to give them pariah status
00:08:18.86\00:08:21.53
and you know, I have no
obligation to deal with you
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go to them and I think
00:08:25.57\00:08:27.70
some of the LGBT
community federal
00:08:27.74\00:08:31.01
were sort to have anonymous
against religious faith.
00:08:31.04\00:08:34.34
Well, so florists,
bakers, cake makers,
00:08:34.38\00:08:40.65
photographers have
been taken to court,
00:08:40.68\00:08:43.28
have been fined
thousands, tens of thousands
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in one instance more than
a hundred thousand dollars
00:08:46.02\00:08:48.79
for refusing to become
involved in a same sex wedding.
00:08:48.82\00:08:53.26
And see I believe the...
00:08:53.29\00:08:54.80
that they've risen to the bait
00:08:54.83\00:08:56.87
because in the real world
00:08:56.90\00:08:58.83
when you're
running a business...
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If I'm a gay couple,
a part of a gay couple
00:09:00.47\00:09:04.37
I go where
there's sympathetical.
00:09:04.41\00:09:05.97
Right.
00:09:06.01\00:09:07.34
So it will
naturally sort itself out
00:09:07.38\00:09:09.84
if people didn't
sort of buttheads
00:09:09.88\00:09:12.08
and try to prove a
point at the other's expense.
00:09:12.11\00:09:13.98
But that's
what's been happening.
00:09:14.02\00:09:16.69
And in all of
the cases I know of,
00:09:16.72\00:09:18.69
it's not that
these business owners
00:09:18.72\00:09:20.62
were discriminating
against gays per se,
00:09:20.66\00:09:23.63
many of these were customers.
00:09:23.66\00:09:26.09
It was when they
were asked to do something
00:09:26.13\00:09:28.46
especially for
a same sex wedding
00:09:28.50\00:09:31.13
when these services were
00:09:31.17\00:09:32.50
widely
available in other venues,
00:09:32.53\00:09:35.24
I think to force
these business owners
00:09:35.27\00:09:37.07
to support a moral decision
00:09:37.11\00:09:39.27
that they don't agree
00:09:39.31\00:09:41.04
with that goes
against their conscience
00:09:41.08\00:09:42.91
is to request a
complicity from them
00:09:42.94\00:09:46.18
that it is that
should be protected
00:09:46.21\00:09:48.52
under the free exercise clause.
00:09:48.55\00:09:51.42
And I think we're going to see
00:09:51.45\00:09:52.79
more and more
of this competition
00:09:52.82\00:09:56.09
between rights
when the reality is...
00:09:56.12\00:09:57.86
Sure of that.
00:09:57.89\00:09:59.23
In the state of
Utah they passed a law
00:09:59.26\00:10:02.26
which protected
both religious freedom
00:10:02.30\00:10:04.30
and LGBT rights in
housing and employment,
00:10:04.33\00:10:07.84
and I think at
the national level,
00:10:07.87\00:10:09.60
we could do the same thing
00:10:09.64\00:10:10.97
where we recognize human rights,
00:10:11.01\00:10:14.84
both the rights
of LGBT individuals
00:10:14.88\00:10:17.35
to make their moral choices
00:10:17.38\00:10:19.01
and the rights
of religious freedom
00:10:19.05\00:10:20.42
of religious individuals.
00:10:20.45\00:10:21.95
You can read more
about it in our book here,
00:10:21.98\00:10:24.52
500 Years of
Protest and Liberty.
00:10:24.55\00:10:28.09
We are now living in the era
of making America great again.
00:10:28.12\00:10:33.50
That's not a bad
sentiment but what does it mean?
00:10:33.53\00:10:37.73
When we're talking
about religious liberty,
00:10:37.77\00:10:40.80
I think that's a very good goal
00:10:40.84\00:10:43.24
because to make
religious liberty great again
00:10:43.27\00:10:45.81
is to
reemphasize the principles,
00:10:45.84\00:10:48.94
and of course go
back to God Himself
00:10:48.98\00:10:50.88
but that, as we've
said on this program
00:10:50.91\00:10:52.98
can be directly seen in
the Protestant Reformation.
00:10:53.01\00:10:57.75
We need to reinstitute
00:10:57.79\00:11:00.26
the separation
of church and state.
00:11:00.29\00:11:02.22
Sure, it's in the Constitution
00:11:02.26\00:11:03.89
but it's a
biblical, spiritual principle.
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It's time I believe
in the very truest sense
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to absolutely make sure
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that religious
liberty is great again,
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that freedom is great again,
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and all of the promises
of the past are fulfilled.
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For Liberty Insider,
this is Lincoln Steed.
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