LIBERTY’S LAWSUIT AGAINST OBAMACARE REKINDLED IN THE COURTS “Atheists frequently cite the Constitution’s free exercise of religion clause as an excuse to eliminate prayer from schools and banish nativity scenes from the public square. ... Liberty’s cause is far more compelling. It is fully consistent with American values that the highest law of the land should protect individuals from having their government compel them to act directly against their core beliefs.” — The Washington Times, Nov. 26, 2012
Mat Staver, attorney for Liberty University and dean of Liberty University School of Law, talks to reporters outside the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va. in May 2011.
From the day President Barack Obama signed his controversial health care bill into law, Liberty University has stood at the forefront of the resistance. Filing the first private lawsuit against ObamaCare in March 2010, and continuing to rise every time the courts knock them down, Liberty has charged that it violates the First Amendment’s free exercise of religion clause, as well as the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act. At stake is a clause forcing every employer to provide federally mandated insurance, which would then require them to fund the abortion-inducing drugs included with this insurance coverage. In 2011, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Virginia ruled that the federal Anti-Injunction Act barred the courts from discussing Liberty’s case. In June 2012, the Supreme Court ruled that President Obama’s health care bill, as a whole, was constitutional on the
grounds that it simply represented a tax on people who chose not to buy health insurance. The bill therefore fell within governmental taxation rights, and all appeals against the law were dismissed. Liberty, undeterred, pressed on. In November 2012, the persistence paid off. The university’s appeal claiming that ObamaCare violated religious freedom and that vital parts of the lawsuit were ignored by the courts was heard — the Supreme Court agreed to rehear Liberty’s case at the Circuit Court level. “This ruling is literally an answer to prayer,” said Mat Staver, attorney for Liberty University and dean of Liberty University School of Law. “It means our legal fight against ObamaCare can go back into full swing. It also gives Liberty University the leading case against ObamaCare in the nation and offers new hope for a ruling that ObamaCare is … completely unconstitutional.”
D AV I D D U N C A N
D AV I D D U N C A N
Liberty students attend a victory rally for Gov. Mitt Romney at Lynchburg Regional Airport the day before the 2012 presidential election (left). Students crowd the Vines Center to vote in a presidential election for the first time on Liberty’s campus, Nov. 6, 2012 (right).
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