Religious Freedom And Individual Rights Case Study

UNDERSTANDING THE BALANCE BETWEEN

RELIGIOUS FREEDOM AND VIOLATION OF CIVIL RIGHTS

INTRODUCTION: Religious freedoms and individual rights have always been a problem in the United States and there have been constant arguments over the original intent of the U.S. Constitution. In recent years, especially after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriage is legal in the United States, many problems have surfaced involving businesses and public officials denying goods and services to same-sex couples as well as not performing their civic duties based on their religious convictions. Problems have also occurred in areas involving business being required to provide contraception coverage for their employees. In 2014, Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, this was a major issue because Hobby Lobby would not cover “morning-after pills and intrauterine devices”. These incidents have lead to several key questions when dealing with these issues. “Should public officials be allowed to place their religious convictions ahead of their civic duty? Should business owners be required to provide goods or services if doing so violates their religious beliefs? Should businesses, doctors and others be allowed to

Constitution. This is very interesting to me because all people talk about today is how same-sex marriage and abortion are freedom and equality, it is what is written in the constitution, and that was the framer’s original intent. If the early United States was a largely Christian society than these statements would not be the case at all, framers would be appalled at these ideas. There is really no way to know what the original framers really intended though, so we can just continue to argue and debate over