WASHINGTON — On the defensive, the Obama administration Thursday scrambled to explain its requirement that church-affiliated employers cover birth control as House Speaker John Boehner called it unconstitutional and demanded immediate reconsideration.
Under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul law, most employers and insurance plans will have to cover birth control free of charge as a preventive service for women. The administration already ruled that churches and houses of worship do not have to follow that requirement, but officials recently announced that many religious-affiliated institutions such as hospitals, colleges and charities must comply.
The wave of protest that followed has clearly taken administration officials by surprise. Catholics, Protestant evangelicals and others across the political spectrum criticized the decision.
"I think this mandate violates our Constitution," Boehner, R-Ohio, said Thursday. "I think it violates the rights of these religious organizations. And I would hope that the administration would back up and take another look at this."
Also joining in disapproval was an important if little-known group that includes Democratic lawmakers who helped engineer final passage of the health care law. Democrats for Life of America represents anti-abortion lawmakers who provided the margin of victory for House passage of the health care overhaul.
"Forcing religious institutions to provide insurance coverage for services that are directly in opposition to their moral beliefs is very clearly wrong," Kristen Day, the group's executive director, said Thursday.
In a hastily arranged conference call with reporters, White House officials would not directly answer whether the birth control decision will be reconsidered. Instead, they pointed to a statement late Wednesday by Cecilia Munoz, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council.
"The Obama administration is committed to both respecting religious beliefs and increasing access to important preventive services," Munoz wrote on the White House blog. No individual person will be forced to buy or use contraception as a result of the health care law, she emphasized.
At issue is a provision of the health care law that requires insurance plans to cover preventive care for women free of charge to the employee. Last year, an advisory panel from the respected Institute of Medicine recommended including birth control on the list, partly because it promotes maternal and child health by allowing women to space their pregnancies.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius agreed, issuing a new federal regulation last summer.
That rule, however, exempted houses of worship and their employees, as well as other institutions whose primary purpose is to promote religious belief. Churches, synagogues, mosques and other places would not be required to cover contraceptives, it specified. Neither would religious organizations whose purpose is to promote belief and that primarily employ and serve people of the same creed.
It was a different story for religious-affiliated hospitals, colleges and social agencies that serve the public broadly.
Although many of those employers had not traditionally covered birth control, the new regulation will require them to do so.
For religious-affiliated employers, the requirement will take effect Aug. 1, 2013, and their workers in most cases will have access to coverage starting Jan. 1, 2014.
Women working for secular enterprises from profit-making companies to government will have access to the new coverage starting Jan. 1, 2013, in most cases.
Workplace health plans will have to cover all forms of contraception approved by the Food and Drug Administration, ranging from the pill to implantable devices to sterilization. Also covered is the morning-after pill, which can prevent pregnancy after unprotected sex and is considered as tantamount to an abortion drug by some religious conservatives.
There is no mandate, however, to cover abortions.