Rep. Kelly Calls Fights over President Obama’s Contraceptive Mandate a Battle over First Amendment Rights

February 16, 2012

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE	Contact: Julia Thornton
February 16, 2012	202-525-0182

ICYMI: Rep. Kelly Calls Fights over President Obama’s Contraceptive Mandate a Battle over First Amendment Rights

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“We are talking about the Constitution. We are talking about a president whose former job at the University of Chicago, he was a professor of constitutional law. So I find it difficult to understand how the Constitution only has relevance in certain days and in certain times and only if it really appeals to something I am trying to push that day. So then we come to constitutional niceties and constitutional convenience, and what we have done, we have turned our back on freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and again [we have] a government that’s too overbearing.”

Washington, D.C. — U.S. Representative Mike Kelly (PA-03) participated in this morning’s House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform (OGR) hearing titled, “Lines Crossed: Separation of Church and State. Has the Obama Administration Trampled on Freedom of Religion and Freedom of Conscience?" The hearing examined how the Obama Administration’s decision to require all health insurance plans to offer contraceptive and abortifacient drugs would affect the religious liberties of employers and individuals who are morally opposed to such drugs.

Witnesses included:

Panel I

The Most Reverend William E. Lori

Roman Catholic Bishop of Bridgeport, CT

Chairman Ad Hoc Committee for Religious Liberty

United States Conference of Catholic Bishops

The Reverend Dr. Matthew C. Harrison

President

The Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod

C. Ben Mitchell, Ph.D.

Graves Professor of Moral Philosophy

Union University