In 2012, the Idaho legislature passed SJR 104, which stated opposition to the HHS mandate requiring contraception, sterilization, and the emergency contraceptives of Ella and Plan B. The legislature petitioned Congress to reject the HHS mandate that required those who sponsor, purchase, and issue health insurance plans should not be forced to violate their deeply held moral and religious convictions in order to take part in any health care system that violates their belief in the sanctity of life. Many different faiths, which, besides being against killing of babies through Ella and Plan B, joined together to protest religiously against contraception and sterilization. They saw this as an attack on freedom of religion and conscience rights. When the president of the National Catholic Conference of Bishops asked the Obama to change this mandate, Obama refused. The president of the NCCB said, "In effect, the president is saying we have one year to figure out how to violate our consciences. To force Americans to choose between violating their consciences and forgoing their health care is literally unconscionable.... It is as much an attack on access to health care as on religious freedom". Thomas Jefferson had said, "No provision in our Constitution ought to be dearer to man than that which protects the rights of conscience against the enterprises of the civil authority". And James Madison, a key defender of religious freedom and author of the first amendment said, "Conscience is the most sacred of all property." I and many others will be forced to either go against my religious and moral beliefs to pay for contraception, sterilization, and the abortion-inducing drugs or pay a fine, a minimum of $695 per person by 2016, increasing each year. I will have no choice with an exchange. If I buy insurance, I am paying for abortion. If I don't buy insurance and pay a penalty, that penalty will pay for abortions. There are many court cases against this violation of religious freedom and conscience. Hobby Lobby, one of the nation's largest arts and crafts retailers, is an excellent example of refusing to cave in to the trap of violating one's conscience. The owners have said, "We run our business on Christian principles. I've always said that the first two goals of our business are (1.) To run our business in harmony with God's laws, and (2.) To focus on people more than money....A new government healthcare mandate says that our family business MUST provide what I believe are abortion-causing drugs as part of our health insurance." Forcing us to buy insurance through a state exchange is an attack on our religious freedom and conscience rights since there is no opting out of these preventative services in the required health benefit plans set up by HHS. Our forefathers migrated to America for the freedom to practice their faith freely without government interference. Are we being hypocritical? To vote for the exchange would be against SJR 104 and our liberty because we are being forced into violating our right to freedom of religion. It would be a vote against life and liberty. Our Declaration of Independence has said that we are endowed by Our Creator with certain unalienable rights that among these are the right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. The Affordable Care Act through the state exchange will deny us life (the unborn), liberty (religion and conscience), and the pursuit of happiness or property (our money in the form of taxes or penalties). Through the exchange, we will be implementing an unjust law and there is no opt o
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