7 states sue Obama administration to block contraception mandate

PanARMENIAN.Net - Seven U.S. states filed a lawsuit to block the federal government's requirement that religious organizations offer health insurance coverage that includes free access to contraception for women, Fox News reported.

The attorney generals of Texas, Florida, Michigan, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma and South Carolina jointly filed the lawsuit in a Nebraska U.S. District Court.

Two private citizens, two religious non-profit organizations and a Catholic school also joined the lawsuit against the contraception mandate, which is part of President Barack Obama's sweeping health care law.

The lawsuit asks a federal judge to declare the law unconstitutional and enjoin the government from enforcing the requirement.

The states filed the suit despite a compromise announced by Obama earlier this month in which religious organizations with objections to the law will no longer be required to offer free birth control to female employees next year.

Under Obama's new approach, insurance companies, rather than religious organizations, will be obligated to offer contraception for free to the institutions' employees.

The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty has previously filed several lawsuits on behalf of religious organizations also seeking to strike down the law.

Houses of worship - such as churches, synagogues and mosques - are exempt from the law's requirement of providing contraceptives to female employees, but religious leaders have expressed outrage that other religious organizations - such as schools and hospitals - are not barred from the law's reach.