new rights for any religious practice or for any potential litigant.” 139 Cong.
Gay rights activists voiced concern that businesses claiming a similar religious objection might start to withhold health insurance coverage for certain anti-HIV drugs that disproportionately benefit members of the LGBT community. . See 42 U. S. C. §§2000e(b), 2000e–1(a), 2000e–2(a); cf. 518, 636 (1819). To correct this oversight, Senator Barbara Mikulski introduced the Women’s Health Amendment, which added to the ACA’s minimum coverage requirements a new category of preventive services specific to women’s health. Compelling governmental interests in uniform compliance with the law, and disadvantages that religion-based opt-outs impose on others, hold no sway, the Court decides, at least when there is a “less restrictive alternative.” And such an alternative, the Court suggests, there always will be whenever, in lieu of tolling an enterprise claiming a  religion-based exemption, the government, i.e., the general public, can pick up the tab. Pp. (citing v. ,

406 U. S. 205

, the Court questions why, if “a sole proprietorship that seeks to make a profit may assert a free-exercise claim, [Hobby Lobby and Conestoga] can’t . Because he objected on religious grounds to participating in the manufacture of weapons, he lost his job and sought unemployment compensation. In sum, in view of what Congress sought to accomplish, i.e., comprehensive preventive care for women furnished through employer-based health plans, none of the proffered alternatives would satisfactorily serve the compelling interests to which Congress responded. These sums are surely substantial. For good reason, we have repeatedly refused to take such a step. Nonexempt employers are generally required to provide coverage for the 20 contraceptive methods approved by the Food and Drug Administration, including the 4 that may have the effect of preventing an already fertilized egg from developing any further by inhibiting its attachment to the uterus. But it could not reasonably be maintained that any burden on religious exercise, no matter how onerous and no matter how readily the government interest could be achieved through alternative means, is permissible under RFRA so long as the relevant legal obligation requires the religious adherent to confer a benefit on third parties. The Senate voted down the so-called “conscience amendment,” which would have enabled any employer or insurance provider to deny coverage based on its asserted “religious beliefs or moral convictions.” 158 Cong. They claim protection under RFRA, the federal statute discussed with care and in detail in the Court’s opinion. First Amendment’s free exercise protections, the Court has indeed recognized, shelter churches and other nonprofit religion-based organizations. 26178 (statement of Sen. Kennedy). In fact, this Court considered and rejected a nearly identical argument in Thomas v. Review Bd. For-profit corporations, with ownership approval, support a wide variety of charitable causes, and it is not at all uncommon for such corporations to further humanitarian and other altruistic objectives. If the Hahns and Greens and their companies do not yield to this demand, the economic consequences will be severe. (iii) Also flawed is the claim that RFRA offers no protection because it only codified pre-Smith Free Exercise Clause precedents, none of which squarely recognized free-exercise rights for for-profit corporations. Id., at 1122; App. 19  The Court does not even begin to explain how one might go about ascertaining the religious scruples of a corporation where shares are sold to the public. There are now 500 Hobby Lobby stores, and the company has more than 13,000 employees. Right or wrong in this domain is a judgment no Member of this Court, or any civil court, is authorized or equipped to make. 103–111, p. 12 (1993) (hereinafter Senate Report) (RFRA’s purpose was “only to overturn the Supreme Court’s decision in Smith,” not to “unsettle other areas of the law.”); 139 Cong. was not used [pre-Smith].” Ante, at 17, n. 18. HHS has not pointed to any example of a publicly traded corporation asserting RFRA rights, and numerous practical restraints would likely prevent that from occurring. 35  The principal dissent makes no effort to reconcile its view about the substantial-burden requirement with our decision in Thomas. . HHS, which presumably could have compiled the relevant statistics, has never made this argument—not in its voluminous briefing or at oral argument in this Court nor, to our knowledge, in any of the numerous cases in which the issue now before us has been litigated around the country. This argument has many flaws. in No. as well as individuals.”

See Brief for American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists et al. The exemption sought by Hobby Lobby and Conestoga would override significant interests of the corporations’ employees and covered dependents.

We do not generally entertain arguments that were not raised below and are not advanced in this Court by any party, see United Parcel Service, Inc. v. Mitchell,
The Court therefore held that, under the First Amendment, “neutral, generally applicable laws may be applied to religious practices even when not supported by a compelling governmental interest.” City of Boerne v. Flores, 521 U. S. 507, 514 (1997). . See also 42 U. S. C. §§2000bb–1(a), 2000bb–2(4), 2000cc–5(7)(A). Stat. (b) HHS’s contraceptive mandate substantially burdens the exercise of religion. BURWELL v. HOBBY LOBBY STORES, INC.No. as provided for in comprehensive guidelines supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration [(HRSA)],” a unit of HHS. HHS would put these merchants to a difficult choice: either give up the right to seek judicial protection of their religious liberty or forgo the benefits, available to their competitors, of operating as corporations. Ibid. The term “person” sometimes encompasses artificial persons (as the Dictionary Act instructs), and it sometimes is limited to natural persons. as Amici Curiae 23. Cf.

. (ii) HHS and the dissent nonetheless argue that RFRA does not cover Conestoga, Hobby Lobby, and Mardel because they cannot “exercise . 4  See, e.g., Hankins v. Lyght, 441 F. 3d 96, 108 (CA2 2006); Guam v. Guerrero, 290 F. 3d 1210, 1220 (CA9 2002). See ante, at 40.23 It bears note in this regard that the cost of an IUD is nearly equivalent to a month’s full-time pay for workers earning the minimum wage, Brief for Guttmacher Institute et al.

The free exercise claim asserted there was promptly rejected on the merits. . Note, too, that Congress declined to write into law the preferential treatment Hobby Lobby and Conestoga describe as a less restrictive alternative. Contrary to the conclusion of the Third Circuit, the Tenth Circuit held that the Greens’ two for-profit businesses are “persons” within the meaning of RFRA and therefore may bring suit under that law.

–579 (1961) (Douglas, J., dissenting as to related cases including Gallagher). P. 32. . See, e.g., id., at 19 (“[W]omen are consistently more likely than men to report a wide range of cost-related barriers to receiving . 13–356, at 10, 48. RFRA speaks of “a person’s exercise of religion.” 124Stat.

And HHS’s concession that a nonprofit corporation can be a “person” under RFRA effectively dispatches any argument that the term does not reach for-profit corporations; no conceivable definition of “person” includes natural persons and nonprofit corporations, but not for-profit corporations. But that choice may not be imposed on employees who hold other beliefs. 13–354. Although these totals are high, amici supporting HHS  have suggested that the $2,000 per-employee penalty is actually less than the average cost of providing health insurance, see Brief for Religious Organizations 22, and therefore, they claim, the companies could readily eliminate any substantial burden by forcing their employees to obtain insurance in the government exchanges. 13–354, at 46, 49. First Amendment. That category encompasses “churches, their integrated auxiliaries, and conventions or associ- ations of churches,” as well as “the exclusively religious activities of any religious order.” See ibid (citing 26 U. S. C. §§6033(a)(3)(A)(i), (iii)). ). It is thus perfectly reasonable to believe that the amendment was voted down because it extended more broadly than the pre-existing protections of RFRA. This argument fails to recognize that the protection provided by §238n(a) differs significantly from the protection provided by RFRA. Under the Dictionary Act, “the wor[d] ‘person’ . This belief implicates a difficult and important question of religion and moral philosophy, namely, the circumstances under which it is wrong for a person to perform an act that is innocent in itself but that has the effect of enabling or facilitating the commission of an immoral act by another.34 Arrogating the authority to provide a binding national answer to this religious and philosophical question, HHS and the princi pal dissent in effect tell the plaintiffs that their beliefs are flawed. That definitional change, according to the Court, reflects “an obvious effort to effect a complete separation from 14  See, e.g., WebMD Health News, New Morning-After Pill Ella Wins FDA Approval, online at http://www.webmd.com/sex/birth-control/news/ 20100813/new-morning-after-pill-ella-wins-fda-approval. Pp. Reg. 26 CFR §§54.9815–2713A(b), (d). They argued that, because HHS imposed considerable penalties (regulatory taxes of $100 per day per affected employee) on companies whose health insurance plans failed to provide “basic essential coverage,” including contraceptive coverage, the contraceptive mandate constituted a “substantial burden” on their exercise of religion—a violation of both the RFRA and the free-exercise clause. Citing Braunfeld v. Brown, 366 U. S. 599 (1961), the Court questions why, if “a sole proprietorship that seeks to make a profit may assert a free-exercise claim, [Hobby Lobby and Conestoga] can’t . Any Protecting the free-exercise rights of closely held corporations thus protects the religious liberty of the humans who own and control them. First Amendment. 1488, 42 U. S. C. §2000bb et seq., permits the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to demand that three closely held corporations provide health-insurance coverage for methods of contraception that violate the sincerely held religious beliefs of the companies’ owners. 393 U. S. 440, See also Gilardi v. United States Dept. Pp.

See also Senate Report 9 (RFRA’s “compelling interest test generally should not be construed more stringently or more leniently than it was prior to Smith.”); House Report 7 (same). See Terrett v. Taylor, 9 Cranch 43, 49 (1815) (describing religious corporations); Trustees of Dartmouth College, 4 Wheat., at 645 (discussing “eleemosynary” corporations, including those “created for the promotion of religion”).


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