

For-profit doesn't mean no conscience: Column

Joshua Hawley
The Supreme Court will hear the contraceptive mandate case from Hobby Lobby, an Oklahoma City-based company owned by the Green family.

Next week, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby, the case brought by the Green family, who owns the company, challenging the Obama administration's mandate that health insurance cover contraceptives. The case will help determine whether conscience has a protected place in business.

The Obama administration contends that starting a for-profit business means leaving religious liberty behind. The administration has effectively told the Supreme Court that for-profit companies have no right to act on moral convictions the government opposes. They are about profits. That position is deeply mistaken.


More important, the administration's position betrays a remarkably cramped view of free enterprise. Such sharp distinction between conscience and profit-making simply does not exist for many American businesses — nor should it.

Many entrepreneurs embrace profit-making and charitable purposes. Companies such as shoes seller Toms and eyeglass firm Warby Parker sell products at a profit with a pledge to devote part of their earnings to the needy. The number of for-profit businesses with a built-in charitable dimension has proliferated.

Other businesses forgo profits in order to honor their convictions. Gap Inc. increased its starting wage for employees out of a sense of social responsibility. CVS Caremark says it decided to stop selling tobacco products rather than continue to violate the company's social mission.

This combination of conscience and enterprise is a vital part of our free-market tradition. If the 2008 financial debacle taught anything, it is that focus on profits above all can cause terrible damage. It was a profits-first mentality that encouraged lenders to deceive customers, ratings agencies to deceive banks, and banks to deceive each other.

American business needs more conscience, not less, whether from religious motivation like Hobby Lobby or from secular intentions. And that is what American consumers want, too. Fully 80% of Americans would prefer to shop at businesses that embrace a social mission.

Hobby Lobby is one of those businesses. Since the chain started, David and Barbara Green have always wanted Hobby Lobby to be about more than profits. That's why the Greens start employees at nearly double the minimum wage and offer generous health benefits. It's why they give their employees extra time off to spend with their families and donate large portions of company profits to those in need.

That's also why the Greens object to having their health plan fund the four (of the 20 legally available) contraceptives that they believe can cause an abortion, something the Greens believe is wrong.

Not everyone agrees with the Greens' convictions, just as not everyone agrees with Starbucks' support of gay marriage. The point is, companies should be encouraged to have a conscience not penalized.

Joshua Hawley is an associate professor of law at the University of Missouri and a counsel to the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which represents Hobby Lobby.
