HOBBY LOBBY STORES, INC. v. SEBELIUS

No. 12-6294.

723 F.3d 1114 (2013)

HOBBY LOBBY STORES, INC.; Mardel, Inc.; David Green; Barbara Green; Mart Green; Steve Green; Darsee Lett, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Kathleen SEBELIUS, in her official capacity as Secretary of the United States Department of Health and Human Services; United States Department of Health and Human Services; Hilda Solis, Secretary of the United States Department of Labor; United States Department of Labor; Timothy Geithner, Secretary of the United States Department of Treasury; United States Department of the Treasury, Defendants-Appellees. Emeritus Professor of Law Charles E. Rice; Professor of Law Bradley P. Jacob; Texas Center for Defense of Life; National Legal Foundation; Liberty, Life and Law Foundation; American Center for Law and Justice; Breast Cancer Prevention Institute; Bioethics Defense Fund; Life Legal Defense Foundation; The Right Reverend W. Thomas Frerking, Osb; Missouri Roundtable for Life; Archdiocese of Oklahoma City; Eagle forum; Sanford C. Coats; Senator Daniel Coats; Senator Thad Cochran; Senator Mike Crapo; Senator Charles Grassley; Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Senator; Senator James M. Inhofe; Senator Mitch McConnell; Senator Pat Roberts; Senator Richard Shelby; Congressman Lamar Smith; Association of Gospel Rescue Missions; Prison Fellowship Ministries; Association of Christian Schools International; National Association of Evangelicals; Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention; Institutional Religious Freedom Alliance; Christian Legal Society; Association of American Physicians & Surgeons; American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists; Christian Medical Association; Catholic Medical Association; National Catholic Bioethics Center; Physicians for Life; National Association of Pro Life Nurses; United States Justice Foundation; Congressman Frank Wolf; State of Oklahoma; Wywatch Family Action, Inc.; The C12 Group; Physicians for Reproductive Health; The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists; The American Society for Emergency Contraception; Association of Reproductive Health Professionals; American Society for Reproductive Medicine; Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine; American Medical Women's Association; National Association of Nurse Practitioners in Women's Health; James Trussell; Susan F. Wood; Don Downing; Kathleen Besinque; Americans United for Separation of Church and State; Union for Reform Judaism; Central Conference of American Rabbis; Women of Reform Judaism; Hindu American Foundation; National Women's Law Center; American Association of University Women; American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (Afscme); Black Women's Health Imperative; Boulder Now; Colorado Organization for Latina Opportunity and Reproductive Rights (Color); Gender Impacts Policy, a project of the Center of Southwest Culture; Ibis Reproductive Health; Law Students for Reproductive Justice; Mergerwatch; Naral Pro-Choice America; Naral Pro-Choice Colorado; Naral Pro-Choice Wyoming; National Organization for Women Foundation; National Organization for Women-Santa Fe Chapter (Santa Fe Now); National Partnership for Women and Families; New Mexico-National Organization for Women (Nmnow); Planned Parenthood of Arkansas & Eastern Oklahoma, Inc., d/b/a Planned Parenthood of Heartland-Oklahoma; Planned Parenthood Association of Utah; Planned Parenthood of Kansas & Mid-Missouri; Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains, Inc.; Population Connection; Raising Women's Voices For The Health Care We Need; Service Employees International Union; Southwest Women's Law Center; Utah Health Policy Project; Center for Reproductive Rights; American Public Health Association; Guttmacher Institute; National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association; National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health; National Women's Health Network; R. Alta Charo, Professor; Reproductive Health Technologies Project; American Civil Liberties Union; American Civil Liberties Union of Oklahoma; Anti-Defamation League; Catholics for Choice; Hadassah, the Women's Zionist Organization of America, Inc.; Interfaith Alliance Foundation; National Coalition of American Nuns; National Council of Jewish Women; Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice; Unitarian Universalist Association; Unitarian Universalist Women's Federation; National Health Law Program; Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.; Asian Pacific American Legal Center; Forward Together; National Hispanic Medical Association; Ipas; Sexuality Information and Educational Council of the U.S.; Campaign to End Aids; Hiv Law Project; National Women And Aids Collective; Housing Works, Amici Curiae.

United States Court of Appeals, Tenth Circuit.

June 27, 2013.


Attorney(s) appearing for the Case

S. Kyle Duncan ( Luke W. Goodrich , Mark L. Rienzi , Eric S. Baxter , Lori H. Windham , and Adèle Auxier Keim with him on the brief) The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, Washington, D.C., for Appellants.

Alisa B. Klein , Appellate Staff Attorney ( Stuart F. Delery , Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Sanford C. Coats , United States Attorney, Beth S. Brinkmann , Deputy Assistant Attorney General, and Mark B. Stern , Appellate Staff Attorney, with her on the brief) Civil Division, United States Department of Justice, Washington, D.C., for Appellees.

Before BRISCOE, Chief Judge, KELLY, LUCERO, HARTZ, TYMKOVICH, GORSUCH, MATHESON, and BACHARACH, Circuit Judges.


TYMKOVICH, Circuit Judge.

This case requires us to determine whether the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the Free Exercise Clause protect the plaintiffs — two companies and their owners who run their businesses to reflect their religious values. The companies are Hobby Lobby, a craft store chain, and Mardel, a Christian bookstore chain. Their owners, the Greens, run both companies as closely held family businesses and operate them according to a set of...

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