NC Birth Control Bill Protested By Women In 'Mad Men' Garb+ bill heads to floor + amended & passed
Donning vintage outfits from the 1960s, a group of North Carolina women sent the message to state lawmakers on Wednesday that while they enjoy watching AMC's "Mad Men," they don't want to live in an episode of it.
The costumed protest, organized by Planned Parenthood of Central North Carolina, took place at a House Judiciary Committee hearing on a bill that would allow employers and pharmacists to refuse to cover or dispense contraception for moral reasons. If passed, the law would violate President Barack Obama's contraception mandate, which requires employers to cover birth control at no cost to women, and would effectively reverse a 14-year-old state law requiring all employers who cover other prescription drugs to also cover contraception.
Planned Parenthood supporters showed up at the hearing wearing 1960s garb to suggest that lawmakers are turning back the clock on women's reproductive rights.
“We love a good vintage look -- but not when it's running the state legislature," Melissa Reed, Vice President of Public Policy for Planned Parenthood Health Systems, said in a statement. "That is why we are here to remind these politicians and bosses who continue to insist that they should be the ones who decide if and when women can access birth control.”
north carolina birth control
Despite the protest, the Republican-controlled committee approved the bill by a vote of 8 to 6, continuing the North Carolina General Assembly's streak of advancing bills that limit reproductive rights.
The House Health and Human Services Committee approved a bill earlier this month that would require teenagers to present a notarized parental consent form in order to access sexually transmitted disease testing and treatment, mental health counseling, pregnancy care or substance abuse treatment. And a bill approved by the Senate Health Committee last week would require North Carolina’s health instructors to teach that abortions can cause premature births in later pregnancies, a statement that was strongly disputed by medical health experts at the bill's hearing.
“We’re here to say to state legislators who want to turn the clock back to the 1950s: We like watching Mad Men -- but we don’t want to live in it,” Paige Johnson, Vice President of Public Affairs for PPCNC, said in a statement on Wednesday. “Women's preventive care - including birth control -- is basic health care. Politicians and bosses have no business denying women access to this basic health care. This shouldn't be a revolutionary idea, but unfortunately it is to some.”
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Virtually any employer in North Carolina could opt to buy insurance plans that do not include contraception coverage under a bill that cleared the House Judiciary A Committee Wednesday.
The same bill bars cities and counties from offering health insurance plans that pay for abortions except in the case of rape, incest or when the life of the mother is at risk.
The measure, sponsored by Rep. Jacqueline Schaffer, R-Mecklenburg, is heading to the floor in advance of the legislature's crossover deadline on Thursday, the point by which bills that don't raise or spend money must pass either the House or Senate.
If debate in the committee is any indication, the measure could face a tough challenge when it reaches the House floor. At least two Republicans sided with Democrats to try to pull the contraception measure from the bill.
"To suggest in the 21st century that a woman could be prevented from having access to birth control, even as far to the right as I am, that's going off the cliff," said Rep. Bob Steinburg, R-Chowan. "This is going too far."
Bill changed before committee
As originally drafted, House Bill 730 dealt mainly with the question of coverage for contraception.
North Carolina law already allows employers with religious affiliations to offer health plans with no contraception coverage. This bill extends the definition of "religious employer" to "include any employer, whether incorporated or not and whether for-profit or not, that has a religious, moral, or ethical objection to providing such coverage."
The original version of the bill also extended the right to opt out of helping with an abortion procedure to any health care provider, not just doctors and nurses, as is the case under current law.
A new version of the bill, which had been shown to some conservative groups but not to the general public before it was presented to the committee, added two sections restricting the availability of insurance coverage for abortion.
One provision says that any health plans created pursuant to the federal Affordable Care Act would not include abortion coverage, despite at least one federal court ruling that such provisions run counter to the law and are therefore unenforceable.
A final section of the bill prohibits cities and counties from offering abortion coverage in their health plans greater than what the state allows in its employee health plan. Currently, the State Health Plan pays for abortion only in cases of rape, incest or when the life of the mother is at stake.
Large rewrites of bills in committee are not unusual at the legislature, and it is not unusual for bills to move swiftly in advance of key legislative deadlines. But opponents of the measure decried the last-minute additions.
"We're doing legislation by ambush," said Rep. Larry Hall, D-Durham, the House minority leader.
Bill draws support, opponents
"I think we all can recognize that North Carolinians hold differing views on these issues concerning certain medical treatment and procedures. This bill strives to protect those conscience rights," Schaffer said.
She said the measure was aimed at making sure nobody was forced to pay for or participate in a procedure to which they objected.
The bill has drawn support from conservative groups, particularly those opposed to abortion.
"This is a matter of religious freedom for these business owners. It is not a matter of discrimination against women," said Tami Fitzgerald, director of the North Carolina Values Coalition, a group that helped push through the amendment to the state constitution banning gay marriage. "Women are free to pay for their own contraception if they want to, but their employers should not be compelled to pay for it."
"This bill has the potential to cause great harm," said Dr. Rebecca Mercier of Chapel Hill, pointing out that contraceptive medications have uses outside of preventing pregnancy.
"This bill is based on some fiction that contraception is controversial in this country and morally ambiguous. It is not. It is an essential pillar of women's health care here and throughout the world," she said.
Women organized by Planned Parenthood of Central North Carolina dressed in 1950s- and 1960s-era clothing to attend the meeting, making the point they believed lawmakers were returning health care coverage to a 1950s sensibility.
Committee discussion was heated
"There is probably nobody in this room that is any more pro-life than I am," Steinburg said. "But I've got to tell you, I've got a real problem with this bill as is."
The conservative Republican told committee members that his wife had benefited from taking contraceptive medication for a condition unrelated to preventing pregnancy.
Also, he said, the state should not be getting in the way of coverage that helps prevent unplanned pregnancies, which often lead to more strain on state health care resources such as Medicaid.
Rep. Deborah Ross, D-Wake, offered an amendment to pull the contraception provision from the bill.
"It's simply not good policy," she said, adding that preventing contraception coverage might lead more women to seek abortions.
Schaffer insisted the bill doesn't make much of a change to current law.
"We're not attempting to change the law," she said, pointing out that there are already health plans that allow some employers to opt out of contraception coverage. "We're attempting to extend the conscience rights of religious employers."
That drew a rebuke from Rep. Alma Adams, D-Guilford, who said the bill obviously changed the law because it would put more women in situations where they would not be able to obtain birth control.
"More women are going to be denied," she said.
The amendment failed on a 7-7 vote, with Steinburg and Rep. Jon Hardister, R-Guilford, bucking their fellow Republicans to vote for it.
On the final committee vote, the measure passed 8-6, with Hardister raising his hand to support passage. It will next go to the House floor, likely late Wednesday.
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The state House has passed a bill dealing with several abortion-related provisions, but only after removing a controversial provision dealing with contraception coverage.
House Bill 730, which passed the House Judiciary A Committee Wednesday morning, originally contained a measure that would have allowed employers to opt out of providing contraception in their health plans.
North Carolina law already allows employers with religious affiliations to offer health plans with no contraception coverage. The committee-passed version of the bill extended the definition of "religious employer" to "include any employer, whether incorporated or not and whether for-profit or not, that has a religious, moral, or ethical objection to providing such coverage."
However, the contraception provision was controversial among Republicans.
"It's going to hurt on the House floor," Rep. Bob Steinburg, R-Chowan, warned the committee.
His fellow Republicans took that warning to heart and stripped the provision when it came to the House floor Wednesday night.
The bill now deals with three different abortion-related matters:
extending the right to opt out of helping with an abortion procedure to any health care provider, not just doctors and nurses, as is the case under current law
prohibiting health plans created pursuant to the federal Affordable Care Act from including abortion coverage, despite at least one federal court ruling that such provisions run counter to the law and are therefore unenforceable
prohibiting cities and counties from offering abortion coverage in their health plans greater than what the state allows in its employee health plan. Currently, the State Health Plan pays for abortion only in cases of rape, incest or when the life of the mother is at stake
The provisions with respect to the Affordable Care Act and local government coverage were not part of the bill as filed and were not available to the public before the morning committee meeting. They now make up the bulk of the bill.
The bill passed the House 67-38. It will be debated and voted on again Thursday before heading to the state Senate.
Even without the contraception measure, the measure still angers liberal health advocacy groups.
"Thousands of our activists contacted their representatives over the last three days to tell them that women - not employers or politicians - have the right to control their health decisions, including whether to use birth control," said Suzanne Buckley, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice North Carolina. "We celebrate the defeat of this extreme, out-of-touch provision of HB 730 and turn our attention to the remaining provisions of HB 730 up for third reading tomorrow night."
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The House has sent to the Senate a bill that would prohibit cities and counties from offering abortion coverage in their employee health plans.
"This does not have anything to do with removing a woman's access to abortion," said Rep. Jacqueline Schaffer, R-Mecklenburg. "We should not be forcing taxpayer to fund procedures they find morally objectionable."
The measure will also affect the health insurance plans offered on the exchanges set up by the federal Affordable Care Act. The exchanges, which will provide a way for people currently without health insurance to buy an affordable policy, will not be able to offer plans in North Carolina that include coverage for abortion procedures.
"It will leave women without coverage for safe, common and critical cares," said Rep. Alma Adams, D-Guilford. "It will force them into back rooms."
The measure passed 72-39.
HuffPo & WRAL 2 3
Many different articles and it's a long read but this bill was and still is very harmful. It was a very sneaky move of the GOP to slip this bill through on the day before crossover. And sorry for yesterday, LJ went off the rails and used me for their antics.