Options
Print
11 Comments
Post a Comment
Email
Coakley's Assault on Religious Liberty
· Monday, January 18, 2010
In 1804, Thomas Jefferson wrote to Abigail Adams on the free exercise of individual conscience in America, and its indispensability to our freedoms. We may disagree, wrote the Founder, but that disagreement is to be welcomed, not crushed: "I tolerate with utmost latitude the right of others to differ with me in opinion without imputing to them criminality. I know too well all the weaknesses and uncertainty of human reason to wonder at its different results."
Martha Coakley thinks she knows better than Thomas Jefferson.
The Democratic contender for the late Ted Kennedy's U.S. Senate seat made her uphill climb to election a bit steeper this past Thursday when she told radio host Ken Pittman of WBSM that persons with certain ethical principles should not work in the medical professions. Pittman specifically asked Coakley about the rights of conscience of health-care providers, and segued into a query on Roman Catholics in Massachusetts's hospitals.
A response grounded in the American tradition of pluralism, freedom of conscience, and an ethical consideration for the autonomy of the individual would have gone something like this: "Ken, it's not the state's proper role to interpose itself between the conscience of the provider and that provider's duties. In America, government derives its moral convictions and authority from the people — not the other way around."
Martha Coakley is not grounded in the American tradition of pluralism, freedom of conscience, or an ethical consideration for the autonomy of the individual. Her response to Pittman was to denounce the idea of any allowance for individual conscience in federal healthcare legislation. Then she uttered the line that alone ought to sink her campaign: "The law says that people are allowed to have that. You can have religious freedom but you probably shouldn't work in the emergency room."
It's not often that a candidate for federal office goes on the record with her belief that whole classes of Americans should be excluded from whole sectors of our economy. Martha Coakley did exactly that, and the only term to describe it is one we should use sparingly in our public discourse. It should be reserved for direct attacks on our heritage as a free country of free people. It should be reserved for assaults on the foundations of our liberties as laid down in the American Revolution.
It's anti-American.
Martha Coakley's declaration that Roman Catholics "probably shouldn't work in the emergency room" doesn't just betray an ignorance of history and society, though it does both in full. Catholic provision of healthcare is a proud tradition of centuries that, if you're theologically minded, goes back to the healings of the Apostles — and if you're historically minded, goes back to the lay and clerical orders that provided care to travelers, pilgrims and the poor beginning in the Dark Ages. In the United States today, Catholic healthcare facilities exist in all fifty states. Despite Coakley's wish that they not do so, those facilities provided care in nearly 17 million emergency-room visits last year.
Beyond Coakley's ignorance, the effect of her pronouncement is nothing short of pernicious. If public officials decide it's appropriate to recommend exclusion of faith groups from employment, where does that end? It doesn't take much imagination to grasp that the threat only begins with Catholics. Adherents of Christian Science might find would-be U.S. Senators questioning their fitness for any health-related profession. Believers in literal Biblical Creation could see liberal officeholders demanding their ejection from the teaching profession. Muslim faithful might be urged out of security and military professions.
The logical consequences of Martha Coakley's statement are both grotesque and stupid.
Martha Coakley does not exist in a vacuum. Her belief that conscience and its protections must be forced out of the healthcare sector are tightly bound up with the ideology underlying the President's push for healthcare reform. That reform threatens ever-greater government involvement in healthcare, and probably portends its takeover if passed.
With that comes the precedence of government priorities — and there's little room for individual conscience then. That's why President Obama last month moved to revoke the conscience protections afforded healthcare workers and providers under Federal rules. As Kevin Hasson and Luke Goodrich of The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty wrote, "Regardless of one's view on abortion, contraceptives, war or capital punishment, respecting conscience only when one agrees with you is no respect for conscience at all. Those who champion 'choice' and 'tolerance' should respect the conscience-based choices of those with whom they disagree."
President Obama is taking the first step toward forcing healthcare professionals to follow the government's ethical agenda rather than their own. If Martha Coakley wins on Tuesday, it won't be the last.
Third-party content does not necessarily reflect the opinions of The Patriot Post.
Options
Navigation
Subscribe
Author Charles Colson: "The Patriot is a refreshing antidote to the mainstream media establishment, and an invaluable resource for straight thinkers." It's Right. It's Free. Subscribe now!
The Right Opinion
Peggy Noonan: Mitt Romney's Moment
Argus Hamilton: From The Comedy Store
Burt Prelutsky: Time to Start Playing Offense
Rich Galen: Obama & Romney Tout Good News
Edwin J. Feulner: 'Law of the Sea' Treaty: Sink It
Arnold Ahlert: With Democrats, You're Either All In - or All Out
Oliver North: Memorial Day 2012- Ken Blackwell: Remarks on Religious Liberty
L. Brent Bozell: Canada's 'Scientific' Museum of Smut
Michelle Malkin: Obama's Land of the LOST
Rebecca Hagelin: The 'Gay Marriage' Spin
David Limbaugh: Obama and Leahy vs. Sir William Blackstone
Navigation
Grassroots Commentary
Policy and Analysis
- Heritage Foundation Insider
- Heritage Foundation Research
- American Enterprise Institute
- Center for Strategic and International Studies
- The Cato Institute
- Hoover Institution
- National Rifle Association
- Ludwig von Mises Institute
- Citizens Against Government Waste
- National Center for Policy Analysis
- The Heartland Institute
Our Mission
"The Patriot's mission is to advocate for Essential Liberty, the restoration of constitutional limits on government and the judiciary, and to promote free enterprise, national defense and traditional American values. Our objective is to provide Patriots across our nation with a touchstone of First Principles through brief, informative and entertaining analyses of relevant news, policy and opinion from reputable research, advocacy and media organizations, so they may better support and defend those Principles, and enlist others to join our ranks." —Mark Alexander, Publisher
The Patriot Post is not sustained by any political, special interest or parent organization, and we accept no advertising. Our mission and operations are funded entirely by the voluntary financial support of Patriots like you!
Frank E. Waterstraat
01/17/10
"Smearing"The never ending Signature of"The PARTY
of TREASON"By MARTHA COAKLEY and the leader of
the"THE PARTY of TREASON"B.H.OBAMA.By the way
if you are CATHOLIC you shouldn't work where
an abortion might be performed.IS MARTHA
COAKLEY really smarter than THOMAS JEFFERSON??
Posted January 18, 2010 at 2:53:22 AM
g.wegmann
The only thing that lefty Martha said that I can agree with is the statement that she made regarding Catholics. As we Catholics believe life begins at conception and ends with natural death. A Catholic should not work or paticpate in abortion. Many doctors will quit as will catholic nurses if the Obamanation medical care bill passes.
Posted January 18, 2010 at 8:28:24 AM
Ruth Ann Wilson
Mr.Jefferson and Mrs. Adams were in a discussion about Religion, that was their right as citizens to have open religious discussion. The Government can NOT and must remain NEUTRAL (Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;) NO law, one way or the other. Government could not come into the realm of "FORCING" people against their conscience. Liberty maintained that all rights and privileges remain with the People. Government was not to make LAWS approving, restricting, or prohibiting, NOT allowed by the Constitution. It is precisely this argument that makes this "Health Care Debacle" so offensive to ALL Americans. It "prohibits the free exercise" of the people.
Do not misconstue what I say. Government has passed so many "UNCONSTITUTIONAL laws" that when tested in the Courts, the Courts should have ruled these laws "UNCONSTITUTIONAL" - OFF THE BOOKS - but because we had this new "mechanism" of "precedent case law" come into "action", Justice has been ruined.
Government - Stay within your Boundaries, that is your Oath of Office that confines you to the
Constitution. REPEAL UNCONSTITUTIONAL LAW - LEAVE US ALONE.
For God & Country
Ruth Ann Wilson
Posted January 18, 2010 at 9:12:23 AM
Jerry Smith
I find it interesting that a man of color would take this position. In my lifetime a doctor of conscience could refuse medical treatment to a person simply because of his or her skin color. Your argument suggests that the Federal Government should have stayed out of this matter as well.
Posted January 18, 2010 at 12:22:31 PM
SULLY
Martha (or is it Marcia?) Coakley is just another typical liberal; she knows better that the rest of us unwashed, uneducated "little people". She needs to go the way of the buggy whip, along with the rest of her liberal troupe. And I find the previous comment by Jerry as extremely sophmoric, condescending, and quite ignorant. Mr. Blackwell's color is the same as every other true American Patriot; and that's a combination of red, white, and blue. Go Scott Brown!!!
Posted January 18, 2010 at 5:29:16 PM
Abu Nudnik
Firstly, kudos to author and to posters Jerry Smith and Ruth Ann Wilson (in particular) for their superb responses and arguments.
All this underlines the sadness I feel when I say that liberal Democrats are neither liberal nor are they democratic these days. The sentiment expressed by Jefferson in the epigram that began this essay can nowhere be found in the Democratic party today. "I didn't leave the Democratic Party," said Ronald Reagan, "the Democratic Party left me."
There is a fundamental difference between Socialism and liberalism, a difference expressed perfectly by Jefferson. An assumption of goodwill on the part of one's ideological opposite is essential to liberty itself. Sadly it is lacking and not only on one side. Power itself brings out the arrogance of the assumption that one owns the truth and that's why the Framers so wisely pitted the three levels of government against one another.
But with open bribery, the open declaration of "principled prejudice" against one group and not another we have a perversity of the democratic process and liberty that I pray from the bottom of my heart will not go unchallenged tomorrow. Let us pray for the defeat of this candidate who is the antithesis of liberality.
One must study again and again the meaning of liberty and its attempts to assert itself in law and governmental structure.
God bless America and true liberalism: an open and free marketplace for everything under the sun.
Posted January 18, 2010 at 6:19:33 PM
Jimmy D
Conscience, in the genuine sense, promotes life Jerry. The history of racism is an unconscionable one. "Doctors of conscience" indeed! In issues of civil rights it is obvious that the Fed Gov has stepped in appropriately on a number of issues. But the exceptions don't prove the rule, my friend. Your inclination to condescend to a "man of color", falls pretty neatly in line with my inclination to view liberals as deeply closeted racists unable to get a clue at the horrendous destruction that has been wrought by the Federal intervention "on behalf" of the black community. 80% of black families were headed by a Dad AND a Mom in 1960.
We're down to well under 30%, Dude, and there is no other earthly reason for that radical and devastating change but Federal policies that were purportedly intended to "help". When you finish digesting that one try to figure out how an organization started by a racist eugenist has managed to kill more than 20 million black babies and get away with full blown support from good hearted Liberals.
Posted January 18, 2010 at 7:25:50 PM
Jimmy D
Conscience, in the genuine sense, promotes life Jerry. The history of racism is an unconscionable one. "Doctors of conscience" indeed! In issues of civil rights it is obvious that the Fed Gov has stepped in appropriately on a number of issues. But the exceptions don't prove the rule, my friend. Your inclination to condescend to a "man of color", falls pretty neatly in line with my inclination to view liberals as deeply closeted racists unable to get a clue at the horrendous destruction that has been wrought by the Federal intervention "on behalf" of the black community. 80% of black families were headed by a Dad AND a Mom in 1960.
We're down to well under 30%, Dude, and there is no other earthly reason for that radical and devastating change but Federal policies that were purportedly intended to "help". When you finish digesting that one try to figure out how an organization started by a racist eugenist has managed to kill more than 20 million black babies and get away with full blown support from good hearted Liberals.
Posted January 19, 2010 at 12:00:15 AM
Joe Brad
To Jerry Smith:........"I find it interesting that a man of color would take this position. In my lifetime a doctor of conscience could refuse medical treatment to a person simply because of his or her skin color. Your argument suggests that the Federal Government should have stayed out of this matter as well.
Posted January 18, 2010 at 12:22:31 PM"
You're missing the point here......no Government has the 'right' to be involved..... just as no person has then 'right ' to health care......however they do have the 'right to provide it for themselves should they choose to do so.
Posted January 19, 2010 at 2:27:21 AM
Brian
I've said it before, but it bears repeating: Atheism is, by definition, a religion. It is a system of belief. It requires an act of faith: You can no more prove the non-existence of God than you can His existence. The constitution guarantees us freedom OF religion, not freedom FROM religion. There is a vast chasm of difference between those two concepts. Oh, and Jerry Smith, the actions of our government in regards to the Civil Rights movement are the first step on the road to an all-encompassing government and the creation of "thought police". Rather Orewellian, is it not? Remember when businesses had signs above the door, or the cash register, or the office, that said, "Management reserves the right to refuse service to anyone."? You don't see those too often anymore, do you? Because the first time someone is refused service, they scream "Racism!" Believing someone inferior on the basis of skin color IS racism, and it IS wrong. Believing someone inferior based on lifestyle, character, or behavior is called "exercising judgement", and it is a blessing from God, as is free will, another blessing the government would dearly love to take away from you at the first opportunity.
Posted January 19, 2010 at 3:24:08 PM
Publius Huldah
No, Jerry Smith, the situations are different constitutionally. Congress has no constitutional authority to make laws requiring hospitals to do anything. "Hospitals", "medical care", "abortion", etc., are not among the enumerated powers of Congress. http://publiushuldah.wordpress.com/2009/09/08/congress-enumerated-powers/
But under the 14th Amendment, STATES could be prohibited from making laws which deny health care to black people.
Posted January 20, 2010 at 4:26:50 PM