Here is a link to a news release from HHS discussing the Final Rules issued by the Trump Administration dealing with conscience rights. The Final Rules were issued on November 7, 2018. This is the latest development in a long running saga that goes back to the Obama Administration’s regulations that required health plans and insurers to cover all FDA-approved contraceptive methods (including methods that many view as abortifacients) and sterilization procedures. Those with conscientious objections to these requirements have challenged these mandates. These challenges led to the Supreme Court’s decision in the Hobby Lobby case. The controversy has continued and the Trump Administration has now issued final rules addressing the issue. One rule provides an exemption to entities that object on the basis of sincerely held religious beliefs. The other rule extends the exemption to nonprofits and small businesses that have non-religious moral objections to covering certain services. The final rules will take effect in January 2019.
Richard Myers
Richard S. Myers, the Vice-President of UFL, is Professor of Law at Ave Maria School of Law, where he teaches Antitrust, Civil Procedure, Conflict of Laws, Constitutional Law, and Religious Freedom. He is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Kenyon College and earned his law degree at Notre Dame, where he won the law school's highest academic prize. He began his legal career by clerking for Judge John F. Kilkenny of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Professor Myers also worked for Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue in Washington, D.C. He taught at Case Western Reserve University School of Law and the University of Detroit Mercy School of Law before joining the Ave Maria faculty. He is a co-editor of St. Thomas Aquinas and the Natural Law Tradition: Contemporary Perspectives (Catholic University of American Press, 2004) and a co-editor of Encyclopedia of Catholic Social Thought, Social Science, and Social Policy (Scarecrow Press, 2007). He has also published extensively on constitutional law in law reviews and also testified before Congressional and state legislative hearings on life issues.
Married to Mollie Murphy, who is also on the faculty at Ave Maria School of Law, they are the proud parents of six children - Michael, Patrick, Clare, Kathleen, Matthew, and Andrew. http://www.avemarialaw.edu/index.cfm?event=faculty.bio&pid=11705E7D4E0111010366
