Noah Feldman, Columnist

The Legal Splatter Where Religion Meets Health Care

California looks like the next judicial battleground between faith and policy.

June 23, 2016 at 2:23 PM UTC

Noah Feldman is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. A professor of law at Harvard University, he is author, most recently, of “To Be a Jew Today: A New Guide to God, Israel, and the Jewish People."

Conscientious objection.
Photographer: MARK RALSTON/AFP/Getty Images

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The Obama administration has sided with a ruling by the state of California to require health insurers to cover abortion – even for religious organizations that object to the coverage. The decision by the federal Department of Health and Human Services, interpreting a federal law called the Weldon Amendment, is legally doubtful, and will probably be challenged in court.

The uncertainty of the law’s meaning illustrates how baffling the conflict has become over the intricate web of legal principles that surround health-care coverage when it collides with religious values.